laundry

October 27, Hiroshima cont.

Funny how even doing your laundry can become an adventure in a foreign country.

The instructional pictograms on the washing machines in Japan were a little cryptic, but our clothes came out ok. Matt found some house-wife manga (kind-of their version of Good Housekeeping). There was a lot of sex but most of it was everyday husband wife sex.

I find cartoon sex to be very odd.

My culture shock still hadn't quite worn off, so we had lunch at Subway. I find the subtle differences with chain restaurants interesting. They had guacamole and shrimp toppings, and sweet potato fries with basil powder. It felt strange when we ordered, as the staff person spoke perfect english with a North American accent. We had been rehersing our order in Japanese but were so stunned that we couldn't manage to order properly in Japanese or English!

There's a lot of rain in Japan, so there are a lot of umbrellas. Shops have rows of tiny compact ones with handles shaped like penguins, monkeys and Barbapapas (do you remember them?), and cute jinglish phrases printed on them. I chose a little pink one with a cartoon pig head handle.

By supper time, I was finally feeling brave enough to venture as far as gyoza with asian food. We found a little shop, Gyoza-honpo Tachimachi, near the neighbourhood where we were staying. Suzuki-san fed us a variety of tasty fish and braised veggies and taught Matt a bit about good sake. In fact, Matt had quite a bit of good sake and went off later, giddy, to find a bottle of the local product to take home. We found out later that the place is even organic.

playing it loose

October 27th

We decided not to go to Beppu.

We had spent enough time on the train lately, thank you very much. I felt so burnt out, and we needed to do laundry.

I had really wanted to see the island of Kyushu. I had been so excited about the 3000 year old camphor trees, the mud baths and the gaudy resort glitz of Beppu. It was just too much to cram into one vacation. I'll just have to stick to one island per visit and go back at least 3 more times.

I twisted my ankle on the way to the laundromat. Leave it to me to come away unscathed from such activities as sky diving, mountain biking and kick boxing, but twist my ankle walking down a nice, level side walk. We weren't even half-way through our vacation yet.

Our hosts put some kind of magic Japanese adhesive tape on it. it didn't look like it would do much, but it worked like you wouldn't believe. I was still very careful after that. I almost twisted my other ankle at least 3 times. Gotta keep everyone alert!

drooling

Isn't it funny that women are more visually stimulated by food than by sex?

I spent the last 3 days doing nothing but reading cookbooks.

like a Magritte painting

October 26 cont. again

In Tsuwano we bought some bananas and an apple the size of my head at a corner store. This turned out to be the cheapest fruit we found in Japan, probably because we're close to the orchards. Most fruit and vegetables there seem to be uniformly gigantic and perfect. And expensive.



We rented bicycles and rode around the quiet little town. The absense of crowds and chimes and flashing lights felt good. It was so clean, with tidy little cobblestone streets filled with very expensive shops.

In the oldest part of town, the impressive old walls and gates make me feel like I was in a samurai movie and a feudal lord was going to step around the corner any minute.



The ditches along the road are filled with brightly coloured koi. Even the river was flecked with the orange and gold of carp as we rode across the bridge.

We wanted to take the lift up the side of the mountain to see the castle ruins and panoramic view, but were told that the last loop had already started. Instead, we wandered over to the Taikodani-Inari Jinja (shrine). It had vending machines lining the outside wall and 1000 red torii (gates) on the foot path up the hill. I saw several fox statues and figures in the complex.

Back in town we didn't have time for a full supper, so we stopped into a small restaurant with long benches and huge wooden beams. They had a sign out front with a picture of ice cream sundaes. It had vanilla soft serve, corn flakes, some kind of berry jam and these little, round, chewy, green rice cakes here and there. Quite tasty if a little strange in texture.

Then it was back on the train. The ride home was less interesting in the dark, but at least we caught the faster trains and napped on the way.

I want my BNW

I read in the news this week that CBC is ditching Brave New Waves in mid-March. Their logic tells them that this will help them attract more listeners between 40 and 65.

I think their logic stinks.

Anyone in this age group that listens to the radio in the middle of the night may very well appreciate BNW.

Brave New Waves is the best radio show I have ever heard. Even without Patti Schmidt, it is still so worth listening to.

In between sobs, I am writing emails to Brave New Waves and CBC's head office begging them to change their minds.

Maybe we have taken BNW for granted, and haven't told them how much we love and appreciate them.

If you have ever enjoyed BNW, I encourage you to let them know. Especially if you are between the ages of 40 and 65.

Home Security

Last week I was doing a bit of research on the local rental market for a newsletter article, and the statistics that I found formed a dreary picture.

By October 2006 the vacancy rate for a 2 bedroom apartment in a multi-unit building was 0.6 percent. That means all the single moms and college students and families new to town who were looking for a place that month had to compete over just 8 apartments.

We have a 3 bedroom townhouse in Edmonton that we rent out and I looked up the going rate in the city. I don't understand how a family is supposed to be able to come up with $1500 a month for rent. A few single roommates could probably come up with it together, but who else? The single income 'family' is a dying breed.

view from the train

October 26 continued

We took a day trip to Tsuwano, a japanese version of Banff. Of course we got away late and were in a rush when we got to the train station. We found a counter and asked where to catch the train to Yamaguchi, our transfer point. This is where we learned a valuable lesson. He said

Hurry, the next one leaves xxx platform in five minutes!

So we ran.

There was the train. It didn't look like a bullet train, but it was about to leave, so we hopped on.

Well, it wasn't a bullet train. It was the slow train, and took two hours longer to get to Yamaguchi, so we only had 2 hours to spend in Tsuwano. Sigh.

Next time we'll know to specifically ask for the 'Shinkansen'.
The ride from Yamaguchi to Tsuwano soothed me considerably, though. We rode deep into the mountains, passing countless remote villages filled with gardens, orchards and small fields. Walled compounds with beautiful old houses sat high like little islands in the fields. The hillsides were covered with thick stands of bamboo and cedar.

These are smaller mountains than we're used to at home in the Rockies, but the valleys are so narrow, bringing the hills in close and making it feel cozy and lush (or claustrophobic, if you're from the prairies).

New Year's discipline

I know I'm not the only one who hasn't posted a entry for weeks, but I still feel guilty.

This is my first step to getting back on track. Without regimented schedules and daily routines, my world dissolves into a blurry mess.

And now to the laundry.