Kinkaku-ji

We arrived in Kyoto and I was expecting to be blown off my feet by the beauty of the place, but it was just another over-developed consumerist hell. Japan is just about shopping. Kyoto seemed more like London where Tokyo had been New York. I had been expecting much more (again my expectations of Japan were too high) as Kyoto was spared bombing during the war. Oh well the beauty must all be in Gion, the old part famous for geishas.

Gion at night

We had some difficulty getting to our hostel. We were starting to suspect that Japanese people cannot give directions. Every time we'd had to follow directions they had been awful; there always seemed to be so much unsaid. It's all very well having a culture that is so precious people don't like to be explicit about things, but it's rather irritating when it comes to things like directions and closing times! We made it there, nonetheless, and the place was huge. Floor upon floor of young people. It was a bit intimidating: how on earth were we going to get on with this plague of 18 and 19 year-olds? That first night we stayed up until 5am drinking and talking to an Israeli guy and a Quebecois, who gave us this great tip about Strong Zero, a fruit cooler that comes in a half-litre can, costing about the same as a can of beer, but it's 8% alcohol by volume. Great tip. Bad hangover.

The next day we got up too late to do anything really, and I didn't feel much up to it anyway. This time our hostel had an excellent internet connection and free wifi, so I spent the whole day online, most of it blogging, while Joanne got excited about the well-equipped kitchen and the prospect of cooking again, and went shopping for provisions to cook with. I only left to get more Strong Zero. That night we stayed up quite late again, but managed to rein it in a bit that night and got to bed about 2am.

We had only been able to book that hostel for two nights, apparently because the hostels all fill up with Japanese people at the weekends, so the next day we had to change hostels. It was in a different part of town and walking distance to Gion, which was just as well because we had so far seen nothing of interest in Kyoto; just Strong Zero and a city that could be British. In fact in Kyoto I decided that Japan is more similar to Britain than the rest of Europe is. Must be that influx of Anglo-Saxonism brought by the Americans at the end of the war.

This is Japan: a shopping mall in Gion

Near the hostel we discovered a cheap Japanese fast-food place, where the food was quite good. It seems to be mostly noodles, but many dishes come with a raw egg and a device for separating the yolk from the white. I watched someone then copied them by leaving the white aside and plopping the yolk on top. I wasn't sure why you wouldn't want the white when all of the cholesterol-, fat-, and guilt-free protein is there, but I didn't want to look like I didn't know what I was doing, so I just left my egg white as well. Delicious and cheap – we now had an extra eating option after supermarkets, which was a relief. The triangles are nice, but they aren't very interesting.

Cheap fast food

A geisha running from the paparazzi

Gion

The LP says this is the most beautiful street in Asia!

A very obediently posing Japanese crane

The "lovely" river in Gion

Fnarr fnarr

Beef birth certificate, complete with pedigree and nose print!

Very expensive beef

We found a place called Sam and Dave's that everyone in the hostel had been raving about and disappearing to every night, so we went in. There was a cover charge of ¥1000 after which we got the privilege of paying extortionate prices for the drinks. We simply couldn't afford it. Instead we went downstairs where there was a bar with no cover charge and quite reasonably priced drinks. It was a Jamaican / Reggae bar and it was completely empty apart from us. How depressing that our first drink out in Japan was in a Jamaican bar!

I thought this was cool

Our new hostel was nothing like as large and did not have as lively a social area as the last one. However we soon discovered that the people staying there were quite happy to ignore the signs saying “No talking in the sleeping area after 11pm”. I couldn't read the Japanese on the same sign, but I'm sure it didn't say “No talking unless it's only foreigners trying to sleep”. The social area downstairs was empty, but the dorm next to ours, separated only by a tatami partition was full of people talking and laughing. We were exhausted by our two consecutive nights of Strong Zero, so Joanne got up and asked them to be quiet. I was too scared they wouldn't speak English and it would all be very embarrassing, but at least one of them understood and they went away with no problems. Shortly afterwards our dorm filled up with young Japanese people, who made loads of noise, before disappearing only to return later with lots of food, which they ate in their beds as if at a slumber-party while chatting and giggling. Clearly the Japanese under “No food in the sleeping areas” must have said “Japanese people can slurp their noodles loudly and keep foreigners awake”. So much for Japanese people being polite! I had heard that there was a big generational divide in Japan and that one of the dividing lines was manners; in fact the Japanese film Battle Royale is all about that subject, and that night I really feel I got the point of the film: sending the younger generation of Japanese off to an island to kill each other seems like the perfect way to cure them of their insolence!

At this point I feel I have to admit that some of our problem in Japan at this stage was self-inflicted: we had effectively wasted two days on staying up late and hangovers, and without that we probably wouldn't have been as tired in this dorm. But dorms are horrible and we couldn't afford anything else. After keeping us up so late, the little buggers got up at 7am and made even more noise than the night before. How do those young things do it?

The river promenade in Gion

We were determined to get something out of Kyoto, so we hired bicycles from the hostel and set off to see some more LP recommended sites. I had forgotten swearing never ever under any circumstances to hire one of the stupid awful Chinese bikes that infest Asia. Why a supposedly technologically advanced country such as Japan imports cheap Chinese rubbish instead of making their own high-quality bicycles I cannot understand. They are tiny. They make a really uncomfortable angle at the knee, even in people small enough to ride them; I watched some Japanese people on them. They have no gears and the one gear they have is for uphill. I reasoned this time we weren't trying to get anywhere far so it would be OK, but I'd forgotten about the knee pain caused by trying to exert a force at 120 degrees from a straight leg. We took the bikes back and tried to get a refund, explaining that it was like a child's bike to me, but instead, after one more failed swap, he said I could take his own bike. It was only slightly better, but I didn't feel I could refuse his bike when he's made such a big thing of it, and he clearly didn't want to give us a refund. I wonder if this is another Japanese cultural thing: the onsen preferred to give us something worth several times what we had paid rather than a refund; here the owner gives me his own bicycle rather than a refund. Would giving a refund mean failure? Or do they just love money so much they hate to give it back?

This was the best bicycle on offer

For luck. Probably.

Not much of an aim are they?

Kinkaku-ji. OK, it's quite pretty.

At this point I more-or-less have up on Japan. This was the best Kyoto had to offer and Gion had been rubbish too. I had expected Kyoto to be the highlight of Japan, which I had expected to be one of the highlights of our trip. There was still Fujisan to look forward to at least.

Infuriating Japanese umbrella use!

The cycle back was a bit better because it was downhill, but rather annoying that we had to constantly bump up and down on the pavements. For some reason the Japanese cycle on the pavement; maybe it's because you can only go just above walking speed on the terrible bicycles everyone rides. As a pedestrian it had been annoying us since we got there; nobody had hit us yet, but there had been plenty or near misses and big frights, so it seemed only a matter of time.

Following a recommendation at the hostel, we went to a sushi restaurant for dinner. It was very confusing. You needed to get a ticket from a machine and wait in quite a long queue as it was a very busy place. Of course the machine was all in Japanese and after a couple of failed attempts at pushing random buttons I gave up and we just hovered wondering what to do. Luckily a nice Japanese girl came up to us and offered to help. She handed us our ticket and said we needed to listen out for the number. No high-tech solution: no video screen with the number; no pager for each customer; just a woman calling out your number, but at least she had a microphone! It wasn't easy to pick the number out, but we practiced listening for numbers in the stream of – to us – completely redundant syllables, and I think we would have got it, but the nice girl who had helped us tipped off the staff when their number was up and the caller came to get us when it was our turn.

Fish nigiri

Tuna nigiri

Mini beef burger sushi!

That night it was very noisy in the dorm again and we remained exhausted as we had been since arriving in Japan, save for the day we went to the Atomic Bomb Museum in Nagasaki. In the morning we sat downstairs, waiting for our train to Nara, and chatted to an 18 year-old girl who had been living in Japan for nearly a year. She had been WWOOFing (www.wwoof.org) and loved Japan. Many people we had met loved Japan, but they were all either there long-term, or it was the first time they had ever been out of their home country; parents seem quite happy to send their kids to Japan, feeling it is a safe option. This girl fell into both categories, and when I said I didn't think we were really getting the country because we really needed longer to see all the social stuff that makes Japan so interesting she said that she had found it interesting for a while, but now it was actually starting to really irritate her: there are just far too many unspoken rules, she explained.

At the train station ticket office I saw three geishas who were all obediently posing for tourists to take photos. I didn't have my camera, so I ran back to Joanne, who had been waiting with the bags, and told her if she wanted to get a better geisha picture than we got in Gion, then she should take her camera there now. She rushed off but came back saying she had been too embarrassed to take photos as everyone else had stopped by then. Later she was cursing herself; in Gion they had all rushed from doorway to car, but here they had been sitting ducks!

written by  The Happy Couple on July 12, 2009 from Kyoto, Japan
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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We had been so stingy the first few days that, even after our expensive meal the night before, we still have some money left over, so we decided to spend it on the ¥1000 onsen package our hostel had leaflets for. For those who don't know, onsen are Japanese hot springs and, we were informed, a must do and a national institution. They are all over Japan and we were in danger of spending the whole time worrying about which one would best and never doing it, so to avoid this we just agreed to go for this one since it was near, sounded quite nice, and seemed reasonably priced; the ticket price included a ferry to Ioujima, a little island off the coast from Nagasaki where the onsen is, and entrance to all manner of different types of hot-tubs, Turkish baths, saunas, and so on. We managed to get a ticket at the ferry port by pointing and saying “onsen” and fifteen minutes later we were walking into a large complex, looking like a health centre. It was all a bit confusing but we followed some other people and came to a reception desk.

Behind the reception desk there was a sign saying “No tattoos”, with a little image of a butterfly crossed out and another one of something more manly. This was first English we had seen in the place. Joanne and I both have tattoos and since onsen are taken naked there was no chance of hiding them. There had been no mention of this in the leaflet at our hostel, nor any mention of it at the ferry port where we bought our all-in-one ticket. We pointed to the sign and she shook her head, but seemed surprised and confused that we would have tattoos. I pulled the neck of my t-shirt down so she could see the one on my chest, which is small, and she shook her head again and managed “sorry”. We were a bit annoyed to say the least, having shelled out what was a lot of money for us and come all the way here without getting any warnings. I looked up the word for “refund” in my phrase book, but it was clear this was not an option, so I tried donata ka eigo o hanasemas ka a slight variation on the sentence I knew, meaning “Does anyone speak English”. She nodded and picked up the phone.

Our private onsen

The onsen island

The onsen resort

The main room of our private onsen cottage

The main room of our private onsen cottage

When we were on the ferry back to the main island it occurred to me that the reason we had been refused entrance to the bar the day before was probably because of the tattoo that was visible on my ankle, next to where the shopping bag I had thought was responsible, had been hanging. What a socially conservative country! Quite a lot of the Westerners we had met in Japan had tattoos, some of them quite large, and walking around with them uncovered. How shocked all of the Japanese people they passed must have been! Ours were only small and caused all that trouble, getting us a big freebee; maybe the manager thought we would break his legs or have his head cut off if her didn't make it good for us.

Surely the next Spiderman villain?

When we got back we celebrated our victory by going out for dinner again, but this time to a much cheaper place, that sold local specialities. Mine was quite a nice seafood dish, but Joanne wasn't very impressed with hers. Nagasaki has a large Chinese and Korean influence in their culture due to having been Japan's only open port for many years. The food was kind of Chinese and Joanne had really gone off Chinese food since our short stay in China at the start of the trip.

Joanne's local speciality

My local speciality

The next morning we had time to see some temples before getting the train to Kyoto. Near our hostel was “temple street” with many temples, including all the best ones in Nagasaki. What a disappointment! Japanese temples are incredibly austere. None of them were at all pretty, in fact I didn't even take any photos, and they were not at all interesting. We decided not to bother paying to go into any since they all looked so dull and ugly. After all the beautiful ruins, temples, and pagodas we had already seen, I suppose Japan was up against stiff competition, but this was like they weren't even trying. A Church of Scotland in Glasgow has more appeal than a Japanese temple. Instead I took photos of amusing Engrish on signs and t-shirts as we whooshed passed the religious monstrosities.

Triangles!

Sign operator must have a sense of humour

Indiscriminate Murder

At last we got a lovely long sleep in our expensive room and got up nice and late. We caught a tram to the Atomic Bomb Museum. We had opted for Nagasaki rather than Hiroshima because Nagasaki sounded like it was quite a nice town as well, whereas Hiroshima sounds like it's just about the bomb, but of course the main tourist sites in Nagasaki are bomb-related too. The trams were frequent, cheap, and easy to use even for stupid foreigners. There actually seemed to be more Romanisation of Japanese script, more English written, and more English spoken in Nagasaki, which came as quite a surprise. We had expected things to get even worse away from Tokyo, but it certainly wasn't the case here at least.

Joanne contemplates atrocity

We spent a bit of contemplative time in the Atomic Bomb Hypocentre Park outside the museum, where a black stone column marks the spot on the ground above which the last atomic bomb dropped in an act of aggression exploded. The museum itself has exhibits of photos, videos, and various burned and melted objects all telling stories of individuals and their families who were in Nagasaki at the time of the blast. Joanne found the whole experience very moving and was shocked at the extent of the damage. I was actually surprised how limited the extent of the damage was, but I think this comes from having grown up during the 80s with films like Threads and The Day After, which depicted the effects of multi-megaton bombs. What actually had the most profound effect on me was considering that this bomb caused as much damage as it did, although it is of the order of one thousand times less powerful than a typical modern bomb. It's terrifying to consider how much damage just one of them would do. I would encourage you to look here http://www.carloslabs.com/node/20 , here http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/gmap/hydesim.html , or here http://bit.ly/11CF7c to find out.

Pledge of Peace

Leaving the Museum Joanne said to me that everywhere we visit the Americans have committed some atrocity: the military campaigns in Vietnam and Cambodia, and the secret one in Laos all leaving behind tons and tons of UXO to kill and maim civilians for years afterwards; the Bhopal Union Carbide chemical disaster in India; and the only ever two atomic bombs used in aggression. Why does anyone have anything to do with America? she asked me. This later became her Facebook status. What had really shocked her were the facts that Russia had declared war on Japan the day before the second bomb was dropped, Japan had already requested peace negotiations more than a month before the first bomb was dropped, and then the Americans' own Strategic Bombing Survey report afterwards came to the conclusion that “certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated”. Yet both bombings still went ahead. We spent a little time in the Peace Park looking at the Peace Statue, but it was raining so we didn't hang around long.

The Peace Statue (impersonating Roy)

Self-indulgence

Delicious salmon sashimi and sake

We had agreed that we couldn't continue with the budget as it stood. Although we were surviving, we weren't having all that much fun, and we wanted to eat something other than supermarket food. We definitely could not afford to increase our daily budget of ¥10000, of which our room was taking ¥6000, so we convinced ourselves that we could instead afford a treat worth ¥5000 once every three days. That meant we were due a treat, so this time we went out to the expensive-looking restaurant we had not been able to afford the previous night. There was no English menu, but our waiter could speak just enough English to help us out. They had sashimi, which is my favourite, but when Joanne asked for nigiri he told us they didn't do sushi. Apparently sashimi and sushi are not usually sold in the same places in Japan. The food was excellent and the waiter was really helpful and did his best, although his English wasn't much better than my almost completely non-existent Japanese. Some people at the next table took an interest in us, and offered us some of their “Japanese crab” and “Japanese rice whisky”, shōchū, which were both excellent. They laughed at us quite a lot but they were very friendly. At one point the all started practising English phrases at each other, but when I looked over and asked my one sentence, eigo ga hanasemas ka, everyone looked a bit shocked and, shaking their heads vigorously, said “no no no no”. We had been warned that Japanese people tend to be a bit shy, but also perfectionists, so will not admit to speaking English unless they can speak it very well.

Sashimi of a local fish

It was a great night, and when we walked out into the street there seemed to be a musical performance being put on for someone's birthday, and they had decorated the already quite attractive bridge outside with candles in little paper lanterns. Lovely! I was definitely beginning to enjoy Japan now. Maybe it was just Tokyo that was horrible.

Lamps across the bridge

written by  The Happy Couple on July 7, 2009 from Nagasaki, Japan
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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Shinkansen (700 series)

We checked out of our horrible hostel run by the nice people and went to the train station ticket office armed with the Japanese note which had been written for us. This time we were successful and got tickets for the Shinkansen. The Shinkansen in the famous Japanese “Bullet Train”, but unfortunately our Japan Rail Pass did not cover the Nozomi, which is their fastest service, reaching 300 km/h, so we had to settle for the Hikari reaching a puny 285 km/h. The trains were very impressive and modern looking. When ours arrived it was one of the newish 700 series, also used on the Nozomi service. Inside it was very comfortable and another large step up from the Indian trains we were quickly becoming less used to. This time there were video screens presenting information about our location and speed in both Japanese and English. At last something modern enough to live up to my expectations of Japan!

Japan Rail Pass

Japan Rail Pass

The journey was very quick and it was possible to get a sense of the speed by watching everything whizzing past outside, but you wouldn't think for a moment you were travelling at high speed from how the train sounded or felt: very smooth and quiet. When we reached Fukuoka on the island of Kyushu we had to change to a standard service, but the whole journey took just over six hours, including time to change trains, for a six hundred mile journey.

We were surprised and pleased to discover the tourist information at Nagasaki station actually had an English speaker, who was able to tell us where to find internet access. We were in the position of having no accommodation organised because we hadn't been sure we could get on the train until the last minute, so we followed her directions to the manga kissa and this time made sure they understood it was only for one person, so we wouldn't be charged twice. This time it wasn't set up with booths, so Joanne just hung around behind me while I looked for local accommodation on hostels.com. After a few minutes the girl at the desk signalled for Joanne to go over and using a Yahoo! translation tool on her phone, let her know she could use the terminal next to mine for free, then put a finger to her lips and said “Shhh”. How nice! We booked the hostel and then noticed that the check-in time ended in just a few minutes. Oops!

We rushed out with carrying our big bags and tried to hurry in the direction of the hostel, but as we were leaving the building someone who had been in the lift with us asked if we needed any help. They are very nice and helpful the Japanese! We explained where we were trying to go and he said we should follow him. He walked with us for about ten minutes before leaving us at a junction with instructions to take us the rest of the way. Unfortunately I had clearly not followed what he said and the route I insisted on taking turned out to be wrong. Luckily Joanne had listened better so when we tried her route we ended up at the hostel. Which was of course closed. But there was a notice up on the door addressed to us, with a phone number to call and direction to the very near public phone box. All going better than the last place. The number didn't help though, because it just rang out. Just as we were beginning to despair and swear a lot, some people staying at the hostel arrived back and trusted us enough to let us into the reception area. Joanne spotted an envelope taped to the desk with our names on it. The envelope had our key in it, but we still didn't know the code for the outside door, so we tried ringing the number again from the call box inside. Again it rang out, but this time it coincided with the phone behind the desk ringing. Clearly somebody had forgotten to turn on call forwarding!

This was a very nice hostel and our room was gorgeous compared to the previous one, however it was nearly twice the price. Now we really needed to save money, so we decided against the rather pricey-looking restaurant some other guests recommended and had supermarket dinner yet again. Three days in Japan and we hadn't had a meal out yet, nor had we had any tea! At least, though, I had discovered some rice spirit cheap enough for us to afford it, even at the incredibly high room rates.

Cheap rice spirit

We headed out again to see some of the sights of Tokyo as well as investigate what a Manga kissa had to offer. We had been told that these have the blisteringly fast internet speeds I had been expecting in Japan, and it is also possible to sleep there for much less money than a hostel. I thought we could maybe sleep there one night to see if it would make a suitable substitute for Couchsurfing in Japan since that didn't seem like that would work out, and also take the opportunity to back up all of our photos taken so far to online storage, just in case something happens to the camera memory cards, the laptop, and DVDs we've been backing up to. The final thing we had to accomplish was to book seats on the train to Nagasaki, which we had decided to leave for the following day.

At our local train station I deployed the one Japanese sentence I had learned: eigo ga hanasemas ka, which means “Do you speak English?”. Thankfully the woman behind the desk said that she spoke a bit and we tried to reserve seats to Shibuya in the centre of Tokyo, however she told us, in pretty good English, that it wasn't possible to reserve seats on the local train, we just had to show our passes and walk through.

The "iconic" Shibuya Crossing view

At Shibuya station we went into the ticket office, having decided to get the Nagasaki booking out of the way, and I tried my sentence again. This time the woman shook her head. Oh-oh! We tried just saying Nagasaki but she wanted to know which train and what time and who knows what else. We scurried away to look for some information, since we weren't going to get it from behind the desk. Everything in the ticket office was in Japanese only, not even any romanji, including all of the time-table books, so we were none the wiser. Instead we decided we would just find the information online while we were at the Manga kissa, then return with the train number and times written down. We were a bit put out by the experience though. Our passes are only for tourists, after all you cannot get them inside the country and they're not available to Japanese residents, but nobody in the ticket office at a major train station could speak English and none of the important information is in English. You can get timetable information online, but you can't book seats online, so you have to come to one of the ticket offices to make a booking, yet they seem totally unprepared for tourists. Odd since the woman at our little local station could speak English. It also seemed strange since I imagine Tokyo must be quite a major tourist destination, but there is almost no English.

We set out for the Manga kissa quite nearby on the Lonely Planet map of the Shibuya. Quite quickly we ran into a problem: even the major streets did not seem to have signs indicating what they were called. We weren't totally sure, after all some of the Japanese sign may have been street names, but there wasn't anything where you would expect a street name. We walked about for a while not knowing if we were heading in the right direction, then we walked back and tried another anonymous street. We didn't find the Manga kissa we were looking for, but found another one and went in. At the desk it was all a bit confusing, but we managed to indicate that the two of us would just share one booth. The price was very high per hour, but the night rate which was for eight hours, looked very reasonable if you saw it as a substitute for a hostel as well as an internet place. As promised I was finally rewarded with some fast internet, although it didn't seem anything more than I'd expect at a good day at a workplace or in a university in Britain. The cubicle was just big enough for two people to sleep in, although it would be quite tight with both big rucksacks. It definitely seemed like a reasonable option. When we had finished online we went to the desk to pay and got quite a shock: even though we had shared a cubicle, we were charged double! Suddenly it didn't seem like such a cheap sleeping option after all, although it did mean we might as well take a cubicle each and spread out a bit.

Shibuya Crossing, ready to go

We walked about a bit, remembering that we were supposed to be enjoying the city, not just getting lost and frustrated, so we returned to train station where we had read in the guide book Shibuya Crossing is one of the most famous crossings in the world. It did look kind of familiar, although it reminded me a lot of New York on TV. I decided that Japan didn't seem European to me, but Anglo-Saxon: it reminded me of the UK and the USA. We saw some trendy young Japanese people in unusual clothes, took some photos and moved on. Another must-see area is Harajuku, we had read. It was quite nearby, so we decided to walk and take in more of the city. On the way I really started to dislike Tokyo. It wasn't just the fact that there are no street names (most of the streets genuinely have no names, we discovered later), but it all just seems about consumerism. I hate it at home and what I see of America on the telly, and I don't like it any more in Asia. It's just all about shopping. How shallow!

We were still suffering a bit of culture shock from India I think. In many ways Japan and India are opposites and some of the change was very nice: the food is light and clean-tasting instead of the heavy greasy food in India; as far as cleanliness goes they are opposite; as far as manners goes they are opposite. But then they are also opposite in cost, which is bad, and also as far as rules are concerned. In India if something is closed, it isn't really closed; someone will be there to open up, but closed really is closed in Japan. Trains and buses don't run on time in India, but that means there is always some kind of backup allowing you to be quite slack, but it seems in Japan if you are late for things that it tough, because that's it. You just aren't late in Japan. It wasn't as easy to adjust as I had expected. India tolerates total slackness and you never need to be organised in advance; you can just make it all up as you go along, but Japan is just too complicated to do that.

Takeshita dori, Harajuku

We got to Harajuku and saw a few more unusually dressed young people just like we were supposed to, including one dressed as Bo Peep and several girls with wings. Most of them seemed to be dressed in some kind of goth style variation. I have since read that the favourite style there is known as gothic lolita. I can't say I really enjoyed walking about Tokyo much; other than constantly getting lost due to the lack of street names, all of the high-rise buildings everywhere make the city very oppressive, and for the most part they're just not as modern-looking as I expected. Everything looks like the 70s or 80s.

Busy on Takeshita Street in Harajuku

I was still so tired that I nearly lost my wallet drawing money. I came out of the air-conditioned room full of ATMs and started walking up the road to rejoin Joanne. After a couple of hundred metres I realised the “wallet pocket” in my rucksack was still open, which usually means I have my wallet in my hand. Sure enough there was no wallet there, so we rushed back to the ATM room. There is was sitting next to the ATM I had used and all around Japanese people were studiously ignoring it. Thank goodness! That was the second time I've got away with stupidly losing my wallet; I don't think I want to a third time.

Back at our own train station we tried again to get a ticket for Nagasaki. It was becoming much more urgent since we were supposed to be leaving the following day. Unfortunately the English-speaking girl was no longer on shift and we totally failed to communicate with the guy who had taken her place. At the hostel we asked if the owner's wife would write out our ticket request in Japanese for us, which she did, but when we asked about the cheap sushi restaurant she had said she'd take us to she told us we were too late. Odd that she hadn't mentioned to us that there was an ending time before, but we made the best of it and bought our dinner from the supermarket again. At least we were saving money. After quickly eating I returned to the station ticket office which the owner's wife had told us would still be open. It wasn't. Apparently she had neglected to say that it was closing in just ten minutes so you had better hurry. I think there must be something in Japanese culture about leaving things unsaid. First the sushi restaurant and now this. I suspect this is partly what was making Tokyo so difficult: why have street signs up when everyone knows where they are?

That evening the Canadians were noisy and kept us up late and I didn't sleep well at all, even after they went to bed. Rather than recovering from our overnight flight we were getting more and more worn out. I really hated this hostel and our tiny little room and wanted to get out of it and Tokyo as soon as possible.

written by  The Happy Couple on July 5, 2009 from Tokyo, Japan
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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The first thing I had intended to do anyway was buy a phrase book, so I left Joanne with the bags and went hunting for a book shop in the airport. I found one and bought it, grimacing slightly at the fact it was more than one tenth of our daily budget; a daily budget which was about four times the highest daily up to this point, and one which we had settled on after lots of financial, arguably self-delusional, trickery that even Gordon Brown would be shocked at. We had already shelled out £300 each for a two-week Japan Rail Pass in India, which was the same as we spent in total for three weeks in Nepal, during which we didn't watch our money at all and did lots of shopping.

The next airport mission before braving the outside world in this new country was to print out the instructions for getting to the hostel we booked before leaving India. We had booked it so last minute there had been no time to print them out then. We found some coin-op internet terminals in the airport and were shocked once again at the cost. Then using it we were shocked at how dreadfully slow it was. Is Japan supposed to be a super-high-tech country with lightning fast internet? There was no printer either, so we settled for taking a digital photo of the map and the directions.

Already we were noticing some very nice differences from India. Joanne's favourite: Japan is clean; the toilets don't smell; and there is almost no litter. Secondly, passers-by were actually returning our smiles, and when we dealt with someone in a commercial situation they were very polite and friendly.

We were ready to go now, so we followed the JR signs for Japan Railways and managed to swap our exchange vouchers for rail passes. The JRP is not available outside the country, however the exchange vouchers you need to get one cannot be obtained inside the country. Luckily we had been forewarned and had done everything right: exchange coupon stamped by customs, visitor stamps in passports. I thought the extra day we had been trapped in India meant our pass would now last us the whole of our stay in Japan but I had miscalculated; it would run out the day before we leave, so we would only have to pay for transport back to the airport. All the rest of our transport in Japan would be free. Surely our budget would suffice under the circumstances?

Everything seemed to be going well: rail passes and phrase book obtained. We were a bit surprised that our rail passes were just little cardboard books. Apparently we would have to show them when reserving seats. Then we saw the turnstiles everyone was going through by feeding tickets through them. What were we supposed to do? An employee waved us over to the end of the turnstiles, unlatched a gate, and waved us through. First the internet and now this! Japan was really falling short of the technologically advanced country I had expected. Both China and Hong Kong had RFID smart cards in place that you just wave over the turnstile to open it; these could have been charged up with unlimited credit for a certain period. Surely Japan could do better than this clumsy and bulky work-around.

Then we got on the train. No maps of the line; no video screens telling us where we were; at least there was an announcement telling us the name of the station, but again I was let down by how low tech it all was. Clearly my expectations of Japan had been just a little bit too high. I had really been looking forward to seeing this country of the future and in fact it had been one of my “red lines” when designing the trip in the first place. The fact that I had been so determined to see Japan had considerably added to the cost of the tickets and the hassle of finding a route which allowed it.

We managed to change lines without too much difficulty, despite the lack of information. I was starting to notice an additional problem to the lack of English. The signs in Japanese most of the time did not even have an accompanying Romanisation of the Japanese script. This meant that maps were of no use, we had no idea from the front of trains arriving where they were going, and so on. Japanese uses three character sets. First and the oldest is Chinese kanji character which are identical to those used in China and give no clue to their pronunciation; you just have to know. The Japanese use far fewer kanji than the Chinese: only a few thousand instead of the tens of thousand for Mandarin and about one hundred thousand for Cantonese; however I wasn't going to learn the one thousand considered basic for junior school children during a two week trip, so that was out. Next up is hiragana, which is a phonetic script containing forty-eight characters. I assume this was developed after distance grew between theirs and Chinese culture and is used to express newer concepts not contained in the original kanji set. Finally there is katakana which, absurdly I think, represents exactly all the same phonemes as hiragana, except it is used when the word has been borrowed from another language, for example “birru” or “kuredit carto”. It seems like pointless duplication to me, but nonetheless it would have been feasible to get a handle on hiragana and katakana within two weeks, if not actually learn them, at least so I could look things up easily. The problem is that all these three scripts are mixed together and the majority of the writing is in kanji. Learning the other two would only let me read one or two words in an average sentence. And this is why the Romanistation, romanji, is so important for foreigners: this is how you can look things up in phrase books or dictionaries and this is how you can at least make approximately the right noises without understanding what you are reading. Clearly Japan was going to be tougher than we had expected. Apart from the scripts Japanese seems pretty easy from what I read in the phrase book: it has a similar structurelessness to all the SE Asian languages i.e. no plurals or tenses, although has most of the same additional complications, like quantifiers and a very complicated system of polite and respectful terms.

When we arrived at the station disaster struck: the strap of Joanne's big rucksack broke off the bag. She was furious because she had bought it new before the trip only about six months previously and it was “a good brand”, Berghaus, but I was worried about what we were actually going to do. The (massive) differences between Japan and India were still sinking in and this really brought it home. In India you can just pay someone well under a pound for them to fix something like that, but in Japan what do you do? We were at a loss. Furthermore, in India, you can take auto-rickshaws everywhere until you find someone to fix your bag, but there was no way were could afford taxis in Japan. The rucksack does also have a handle on the side so you can carry it like a suitcase, so that was what Joanne had to do until we got to the hostel.

Outside I noticed something else a bit backward and surprising: like all SE Asian countries we had been to, and India, the overhead wires were a shocking tangle and looked like all sorts of disasters waiting to happen. Surely they at least have health and safety in Japan? More and more it was looking like my ultra-modern image of Japan was completely misplaced. But apart from the distinctly Asian wiring, it looked much more like Europe than I had expected. Another feature from my imagination which was missing in reality was the ubiquitous small Japanese car. It just doesn't exists! The cars were just as big as Europe, in fact I thought that there were far more Buicks and other infamous large American “gas guzzlers”. What happened to the country of the future?

The map and directions to the hostel could have been much better but we did manage to find our way there. This feat was not helped by the fact that none of the road signs had accompanying romanji, yet the instructions had only the Romanised street names and no Japanese representation, so we couldn't tell what street we were on. When we arrived reception was closed and a sign indicated that check-in is at 4.30pm. This was despite the fact check-out was stated to be 10am. The notices went on to inform us that early check-in was possible with payment of 50% of the room fee after 3pm, increasing in steps to 90% before midday. The room was already about ten times what we had been paying on average in India and four times more than the most we had paid anywhere, except Hong Kong, and it was still nearly double that. We had no choice but to wait, although we were exhausted after our overnight flight.

There was a helpful map outside showing where we could get cheap food. It wasn't cheap by the standards to which we had become accustomed but to be fair it was quite cheap by Scottish standards: the sign said ¥250 for a bento box, which in my experience had been nice little assortments of sushi. The Yen is almost one-to-one with the US cent, so it didn't seem too bad. I left Joanne attempting to sew up her bag with dental floss and headed out. The bento place was crazy: there was a long queue of people and one woman at the counter doing most of the serving, who was constantly jabbering away in Japanese. She sounded something like a auctioneer, or a commentator or pundit at the races. It was very entertaining but the selection was not quite what I had been imagining: I returned with one box containing a burger and rice with spicy tomato sauce, and another containing a piece of fried chicken and rice. Oh well, beggars can't be choosers!

After eating we felt a bit better and Joanne had noticed that the office door was open, so we dumped our bags inside, leaving a note explaining that we would be back in time to check in, and set off to check email and find whether any of our last-minute couch requests had been successful. It was clear that we were not going to be able to afford to stay in hostels, so it was vital that the Couchsurfing worked out. We had been assured that Couchsurfing is easy in Japan, so we still hoped for the best. We found an internet place which was very expensive and also had shockingly slow connection, probably the slowest we had encountered since Cambodia, which amazed me. The Couchsurfing news was not good. A few people had replied but they were all saying no, because it's a very busy time at the moment as it's the peak holiday season. To compound matters, the Tokyo message board we were thinking of posting a last-minute plea for help to already had a last-minute plea for help and the responses to it were incredibly unpleasant and unfriendly. We were shocked because in every other country we had visited we had kept an eye on the Couchsurfing bulletin boards and never seen anything like that. It is, strictly speaking, discouraged to post a couch request to the group, but many people do it out of desperation, either because they have had so many rejections or simply because they were too disorganised to get around to it in time. We were somewhere in between, but after having seen all of the self-important patronising responses this poor guy got we decided to forget Couchsurfing in Tokyo. Choice phrases were “Couchsurfing isn't a band-aid”, “Why don't you re-read the guidelines and think for a while about what Couchsurfing is all about”, and “There are plenty of hostels in town and even some stairwells”, "Nobody owes you anything". Lovely! In other countries people run around trying to help even hapless fools out when they post a message like this, but in Japan it seems you just get mauled. A very upsetting surprise, especially when everyone in person had so far seemed so friendly. To be fair most of the people posting these remarks were foreigners living in Japan, but they had clearly developed a very high opinion of themselves in this position. The Japanese people on the forum seemed more of the opinion that Japanese people are so nice and friendly that everyone just wants to take advantage of them.

Defeated, we returned to the hostel and I dozed on the bench outside for a while. Soon the owner came back and started to check us in even though it was only just after 3.30pm. He seemed like a very nice friendly guy, full of helpful information about trains and suchlike. He was telling us that we don't need to worry about security at the hostel much because they have never had any kind of theft or other trouble, when he stopped himself and said that they did have one kind of trouble, but that was when a customer didn't pay. He was from Ghana, the owner explained, then said that he knows he shouldn't be prejudiced, but now he is. He went on to explain that Japanese people are very trusting, very stupid. Caucasians though, he told me, are very clever. Apparently because of Caucasians cheating the public telephone boxes and some other public services they had all been withdrawn because they took advantage of the Japanese stupidity. Of course I said that I thought that was nonsense and Japanese are well-known for their ingenuity, but he was having none of it: they were very stupid. I hadn't noticed the connection to the Couchsurfers at this point, but this turned out to be a common preoccupation with Japanese people; they are paranoid about being so nice and polite that evil foreigners will just take advantage of them. In fact many of the Japanese Couchsurfing hosts say something similar on their profiles. Ironically this makes them not at all nice, and far less so than the average Couchsurfer elsewhere, but the natural tendency does seem to be towards niceness. Why some of them want to fight against it in this way I cannot understand. Maybe that's what happens to individuals who aren't nice born into a society built in politeness.

By the time the owner had finished it was about 4.30pm anyway, so we weren't checking in early after all. He showed us to our room, after we refused his offer of a more expensive bigger room which looked like a cell. This was the smallest room I have ever seen in my life. It was obvious that they had put up partitions just so that they could cram in more people than if it was a dorm. The partitions between rooms didn't even go to the ceiling and they were made of chipboard and plasterboard, and in some places something even thinner; could it be cardboard? In the space that had originally been a medium-sized room, smaller than many of the places we had stayed in India (and much smaller than some), there were now four rooms, each with a bunk bed, and a common area / kitchen and a shower room / toilet. Absolutely tiny, but we had no choice. All over there were posters excusing the tiny size of the rooms by the fact that it was so incredibly cheap. I couldn't believe it was so expensive and that was before I saw how little space we had. The common area had one computer for coin-op internet. Again it was horribly slow and expensive. I just couldn't understand it.

Our bijou room

We took the owner's advice and went out looking for a place where they sell cheap sushi after a certain time, but we couldn't find it. Of course all the shop and restaurant signs are in Japanese so we had no idea what anything was. Instead we settled for a supermarket we passed and bought some sushi there. It was more than we were used to paying for food, but from the supermarket we could just about afford it. Clearly this was how we were going to be eating in Japan. When we returned and said we hadn't been able to find the place, the owner's wife offered to take us the next evening. They really were very nice people.

Back in the common area our neighbours has appeared. They were all Canadians and they had been shopping. Of the two couples, one girl had apparently gone completely overboard and they had been shopping for several days non-stop. Clearly they had come to Japan with the correct amount of money, although goodness knows why they had chosen to stay in a sardine tin like that. When we went to bed I could hear the guy on one side sniffing and on the other side I could hear someone's personal stereo. What a place!

View from my bed

Child extras

I was quite sad to be leaving India because I don't think we really gave it a fair chance, and I now intend to return to India one day and travel just in India, so I will have more time for it. Joanne, however, does not intend ever to go to India again, so I'm not sure how that will work. It was strange how different my experience was this time compared to the last time. A lot of it has to do with the fact I had Joanne with me this time, and she is more upset by the dirt and the smells of India, which in turn upsets me to see her unhappy, but I think the main difference is that this time we had to expend a lot of effort on financial transactions and deal with a lot of crowds. Any time money is involved, particularly relating to transport, or any time there is a crowd, it brings out the hardest to deal with aspects of Indian culture if you are used to Western culture: there is so much cheating, pushing, and arguing it can all be quite unpleasant if you let it get to you. Last time I was more or less being baby-sat by the college I was studying at and all of the transport was taken care of, and all of the buying was either done for us or smoothed out in advance. Also this time, because we were travelling through, most of the contact we had with people was in a crowd or buying something. In these situations Indians never smile and can seem very unfriendly. Last time I was in the same place with the same people for longer, and they weren't trying to get anything extra out of me. In that kind of situation Indians can be very sweet, earnest, and philosophical people, although still very serious most of the time.

"Passing" rickshaw extra

Most of the time the negative aspect in this trip did not get to me, in fact some of it can be quite fun: it all seems like a bit of a game they are playing. One particular game is “the change game”. For some reason there never seems to be enough Rs10 notes. This means vendors never want to give you any of their hoard and will lie that they have no change. Soon you also start hoarding and lying about having change just so that you can buy small things should the occasion arise later. The way to win this game is insist that you have no smaller money and indicate that you will not be buying if they can't give you change; of course this opens you up to the possibility of a revenge short-changing, but you just have to keep your wits about you.

Nice Indian lady extra

Despite all the extra frustrations this time, I actually enjoyed it more. Previously I wasn't really exposed to the “real India” at all: I didn't get to see how the society really functions, and I wasn't doing any of the same things that Indians do. OK, this time we were still tourists, but we were definitely closer to the action and saw much deeper into the country than I did last time, even though I was in the country longer last time. It's a fascinating place, but a really tough place. The poverty, in particular the begging, are very upsetting and guilt inducing. But the place is also really beautiful: the Taj Mahal and Varanasi are both incredible and Varanasi grows on me more and more when I look back at the photos.

This guy just got in our rickshaw for a free ride

written by  The Happy Couple on July 3, 2009 from Delhi, India
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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Soaped up

The shave started all according to plan: we agreed on Rs20 and he went to work. When he was finished he asked if I wanted a face massage. I was asked this after the first shave I had, but not the second and I had regretted saying no since the first one because I was sure Big Davie told me that he got a face massage included with his Rs20 rejuvenating shave. So this time I was not going to miss out and said yes. Joanne came in with her sandals during my massage which was OK, but not as good as the one Joanne's beauty therapist niece, Maxine had once given me. Once that was all over he said something to me which I thought was “finishing off?” and I assumed he was talking about the aftershave they usually finish with, so I said yes again. Before I new it my face was getting covered in a whitish caking substance. A face mask! I had never had one before and I can't say I really enjoyed it. I particularly didn't enjoy sitting there while other people could see me apparently paying to be pampered, but while I was starting to panic about the amount of time ticking away when we had so much to do. Do face masks really need that amount of time?

Nearly finished

Despite me holding us up we were still sure we could get everything done in time for the taxi we had booked to the airport, but just to make sure we broke with personal protocol and decided to splash out on an auto-rickshaw to Connaught Place where our next mission was: posting home a parcel of Joanne's new sandals and a couple of books I wanted to keep. When we arrived at the post-office the rickshaw driver ask us if we wanted him to wait for us, and when we agreed he asked how long we would be. About ten or fifteen minutes, it depends on them, we said.

After queuing for a bit we explained that we wanted to send these three items to the UK, whereupon they sent us back outside to get it wrapped. We had been expecting them just to put the stuff in a box in the post office itself but instead we had to wait around outside for about fifteen minutes until the freelance wrapping expert they use returned to his post. He asked for a small fee and we handed over the items, which he then started to sew up in a piece of canvas, which took some time. When he eventually finished we rushed back inside thinking we might still have time to shower and change before our airport taxi arrived. In fact we had to wait in a very long and very slow moving queue and when we eventually got to the front the man behind the counter did not seem to have any idea what he was doing. He kept wandering off for the next form to fill in, and at one point sent us back outside to borrow the wrapping man's pen and write the address, then later sent us out again to write the sender information on the canvas. Then we had to pay for a photocopy of Joanne's passport, which he disappeared for about ten minutes to make, and when he finally got around to weighing it and telling us the price we were five minutes over the “very latest we need to leave” and the auto-rickshaw driver had been in twice to check we were still there. We were surprised how high the price was (surface mail was apparently not an option) and since we didn't know how much longer this could go on for we just told him it was too much and stormed out with the silly canvas package. We were about an hour in there, just to post a parcel. Not for the first time I thought that the West has no reason to fear India as an economic threat and marvelled at their incredible bureaucracy and obstinacy.

Our patient auto-rickshaw driver was still there and returned us to our hotel just in time for us to retrieve our bags and book a hostel in Tokyo, since there were still no responses to our Couchsurfing requests, before our airport taxi arrived at the door. We were sweaty, unwashed, and still wearing our sweaty clothes. At least we'd be able to change at the airport.

When we arrived at the airport we discovered that Indian bureaucracy had not yet finished with us. At the door of the terminal building we were turned away by the armed guards because we were too early to check in. Instead we had to wait on the opposite side of the road in the waiting room. I remembered many very miserable hours in that waiting room from the last time I was in India but, luckily, they have upgraded it so that it now has a fast food cafe in it, instead of absolutely nothing at all except for some broken seats. When the allotted time had nearly passed we went back over the road and the guard grudgingly let us in. There was a post office in the terminal, so Joanne sent the package there while I changed in the toilet. It seemed to go much more smoothly there, but it still cost the same. After we had both changed we set about looking for our check in desk, but could see no sign of our flight. As the time grew closer and our flight had still not appeared on any boards we got a bit nervous until we finally cracked and asked someone.

This flight is not on today, we were told. “You mean it's cancelled”, we said. No, not cancelled, just not on today, they insisted. They fetched a representative for Japan Airlines with whom we were flying and he marched us up and down, checking with people and making phone calls until he was able to confirm that the number of flights on this route had been cut two months previously, so we should have been rescheduled for the next day. But nobody had told us. He asked who our ticket holder was and when we said BA took us out of the building into a neighbouring office. This was not as straightforward as you would think because we all had to sign out of the terminal building again, including an excuse for leaving. Having taken us up one floor to a BA office, he promptly disappeared, clearly feeling he had dispensed with his duty. The two girls behind the desk were a bit confused and quite annoyed to be lumbered with us. It turned out to be the lost luggage office, but it was the only BA place still open after 5pm. They told us they couldn't help and wrote down a number for us to call, sending us back outside to a call box. We duly lugged our big bags down to the phone only to discover that the number did not work and when we returned to the office to check the number it too was shut. BA have no representation at all in Delhi International Airport after 6pm. A helpful janitor unlocked the door for me and I went in. Even more annoyed the girl I spoke to said that it wasn't BA's fault and I should contact whoever I booked the ticket through. Stuck an extra day in India and stuck right in the middle of their obstinacy again!

We didn't know what to do. Clearly we weren't going to get our flight until the next day, but unable to contact BA to find out whether they would give us compensation, we didn't know whether to just book into some convenient hotel or to return all the way to Paharganj and look for another cheap place within our budget. Not knowing what else to do, I sent my friend John a text asking him to get in touch with STA where I booked the tickets and ask them to call me on my Indian mobile number. We didn't have enough credit or money to call internationally, but I hoped this would work. John had already been a lifesaver several times when we needed information in a hurry but had no access to the internet; a quick text to John and the information is usually returned by text in just a few minutes. John came to the rescue again and I was soon talking to someone from STA who confirmed what I had suspected: BA were responsible for letting us know about the change of schedule, since STA no longer received notification relating to our schedule after we made the first changes. The guy was very helpful, though, and when I said there was nobody from BA to speak to there, he offered to call BA in Britain. A few minutes later he called back and told me that BA accepted responsibilty and would compensate us, so I should just go ahead and book into a hotel. He didn't think it would be a problem to get compensation for a fifty pound room in the nearby three-star hotel a taxi driver kept walking past and suggesting we go to.

Before we went with the taxi driver I confirmed there was a bar and a restaurant in the hotel, since we were now both starving and in dire need of a drink. Yes, he told us, and added that there was also TV, internet, Air-conditioning, and breakfast all included in the price. Great! A wee bit of luxury for our extra last night in India to make up for this awful turn of events. We took the taxi to the hotel, being sure to get a receipt. We eagerly checked in and dropped our bags in the room. The room was rather disappointing for three stars and we had actually stayed in similar places for nearly one tenth of the price. The TV turned out not to have any English language channels either. But it was the first time we'd had aircon in India. We left our shabby room behind and went to the desk to ask where the bar was. No bar. But they said they could get us alcohol and we ordered a few beers. They wanted cash up front, which was odd, and also problematic because we had spent all of our Rupees in advance of the rescheduled flight. It was not possible to put the beer on the bill apparently. Clearly this hotel wasn't even licensed, so I was going to be able to pay for beer by credit card along with everything else. It also meant, rather annoyingly that we would not be compensated for the drinks, and I was determined that we deserved to be compensated for some alcohol after all the stress it had caused us.

The manager directed me to a nearby cash machine, where I discovered that the ATM was refusing me card again. I returned and pleaded with them to put it on the bill, but they just sent me to the next nearest ATM, which was attached to the nearish Radisson Hotel. While I was in there I popped in to check their room rates, wondering if the compensation would stretch to that, fully intending to leave our horrible, barless hotel if it was at all reasonable. It wasn't: it was about five times what we were paying, so I just went to the cash machine. No money again. When I got back I was raging and had decided we would just get a taxi to another hotel if they couldn't help me out. I really wanted a drink! Maybe the could tell what I was thinking because suddenly it became possible to put the beer on the bill and we were able to get slightly drunk before falling asleep and dreaming of Japan.

written by  The Happy Couple on July 2, 2009 from Delhi, India
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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Real India curry. Greasy as anything.

We were definitely ready to leave India now, and were getting really excited about Japan: after picking up our passports complete with Chinese visas, we bought a Japan Lonely Planet for a very reasonable price and that night decided to treat ourselves to a relatively expensive meal out in Parikrama, a rotating restaurant I had eaten at during my last trip to India. I remembered the food was OK, nothing special, but the view was great and the whole thing was quite fun. Since it was nearly our last evening in India we decided to go for the full dish each and what a place to do it!

My food was shiny with fat. It seems in India the more you pay for your food the more fat is in it. Obviously they still associate fat with prosperity and wealth instead of the other way around like we now do in Scotland. And middle-class Indians certainly are fat, on the whole. I'm sure they must at least rival Glaswegians for the higher heart attack rate. The meal came to Rs1600 for the two of us, which is not expensive by Glasgow standards but it's probably more than ten times what we had normally been paying. A young Indian couple came in and sat at the next table while we were eating and the girl looked really shocked when she opened the menu and pointed out the Rs40 rotis to her blanching boyfriend; they are usually no more than Rs4.

Sinister-looking building on way back from Parikrama

written by  The Happy Couple on July 1, 2009 from Delhi, India
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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Before India we had been trying to eat street food as much as possible, but in India Joanne had never fancied it so we'd never had any. This had posed us with a bit of a calorie problem, as restaurant portions in India are huge and greasy, but we had been very restrained and had shared one portion at almost every meal. There were loads of tasty looking food stalls in Paharganj though, and I was determined to have street food at least once in India. Rs20 was all it cost for probably the best curry I'd had in India, served with two stuff parathas. I think I was ripped off actually, as a customer had told me it would cost Rs15, but a tourist mark-up like that I can live with; it's when they think they can charge tourists double that I start to object. Again Joanne didn't fancy it, but I went ahead without her. We struggled to find her something as we were running really low on cash and the ATMs were all playing one of their periodic no-money tricks on me.

A relatively quiet queue at the train station

It was quite a shock to be back in the crowds of Delhi and the heat in Delhi was a bit much for us after all the time spent in quieter, cooler mountain towns, so we retired to room and lazed about most of the day, watching Bollywood on TV. Joanne had never seen any Bollywood before and decided that she really like it. Actually I really like it as well – another thing I love about India! We were waiting to see Swarg when it came on at 7pm. This was the new TV series we had worked on as extras for a day in Mumbai. It had started the day before so we had missed it travelling on the overnight bus. As soon as the program started we recognised the scene as one of those we were present for. It was quite surreal watching the finished version after having witnessed take after take. The production quality was far higher than we had expected after witnessing the set and the performances from behind the camera, but the magic of television really had worked wonders on it and it seemed like quite a polished, very professionally made piece of television. It just goes to show how little I know about making television as I clearly had not been able to imagine anything close to what the director saw while it was being filmed. Alarmingly, though, the cuts were far faster than I had expected and the shots were much closer in to the actors than I thought. The net result was that there was far less footage of the extras than I thought possible. At first there was no sign of us at all so I started to focus more on the background. I suspect that quite a bit of digital post-processing had been done on the background because some action seemed to go at a slightly different speed from the foreground, and some seemed to be taken from a slightly different angle, but mostly there seemed to be far less going on than there had been at the time of shooting. In a couple of split-second cuts we spotted the two blond dutch people who had worked with us, and after downloading and extensive analysis, we believe Joanne also appears briefly, but I am almost certainly not there. I suspect some digital editing was to blame there. I can just imagine how it went: “Look at the state of him! Take him out. Leave in the girl and, oh yes, the two young blond ones”. Even the scene I was certain would contain lots of me had none. They must have re-shot it on subsequent days! Our dreams of Bollywood stardom – over!

You can watch "our" bit of the program here: http://www.desi-tashan.com/?ID=620478784e4311ab or else by searching for: Swarg colors 30th June.

And this is a reminder from when it happened: http://www.blogabond.com/CommentView.aspx?CommentID=72447

A postcard for whoever is first to add the time Joanne appears as a comment below! And if anybody finds a higher definition version than the above link, please let me know so I can go through it more closely looking for myself!

written by  The Happy Couple on June 30, 2009 from Delhi, India
from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon
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