You had me at herro…

Our last night in Japan at the Ryokan was incredible, especially since Tom asked me to marry him. I said "Of Course!" and then later qualified my statement to include the requisite "Yes!" that one usually gets in response.

So, now we're officially engaged, and Tom picked the perfect time and place to propose. I'm not going to give too many details, because that's just for us. Let me tell you that it was incredibly heartwarming and everything I could ever dream of a proposal being. Incredible. I can't even begin to describe how perfect it all was. Really.

So now that Japan is over, we've got a wedding to plan - in six months! Wooo!

Ok, who wants to be a bridesmaid?

10.13.06 11:29pm(18 comments)

I fail it.

I am at a Seattle's best in Roppongi Hills listening to Engrish renditions of our favorite light jazz and soft rock tunes and could as well be stateside from the looks of it.

I just called, to say, I ruv you.

Here's the problem, there is a a website that will tell you where all the free spots are in tokyo. Go ahead, click on a map button. Yeah - that's why I'm at the seattle's best. It's hard to read a japanese map when you can't read japanese - especially in Tokyo where the addressing scheme is super fucked up. They don't have street addresses here, per se and most of the streets don't have proper names. I'm not going to go into it, but it's nothing like what I'm used to.

So I'm wasting my battery away trying to find another place to go where I feel like I'm actually in JAPAN doing my homework and not having fun with everyone else.

*sigh*

Oh, quick run down of what we've been up to

Hiroshima and Miyajima then

Osaka with the Umeda sky building and international beer summit where we made some friends and sang karaoke for most of the night then

Day of rest after severe hangovers, and checking out of the Ramada (pronounced like ramadan, without the N) and riding the shinkansen back to tokyo then

Asakusa and Harajuku to the Okiyoe museum and kiddyland then

Today the boys go to fuji and I try desparately to find a place with free wireless so I can do my homework and not be stuck in the hotel room all day.

Oh well, this is the last assignment I'll have to hand in while I'm in Japan.

10.09.06 12:27am(8 comments)

Kattobase Fukudome! Ho-muran!

Oh yeah, so we got up way early in the morning and headed over to the tsukiji fish market. The market was right on the line that we were closest to (hibiya) so it wasn't that hard to get there. Once we got off of the subway, we headed off, but obviously were not at the fish market (although we did end up at a cool market type place, but there was more than just fish there). So after consulting a map, we headed in the right direction and eventually made it to the market.

Sidebar: This seems to be a recurring theme on the trip - go wonder around and waste 15 or so minutes until you realize you are lost and *then* consult a map to get where you need to go. As users of public transportation and residents of a large metropolitan area, this drives Tom and I nuts, so we've volunteered to be in charge of directions. Still, we're not quite in the know as to the destination sometimes, only vagueries, so it makes it incredibly difficult to plan our way in advance, despite our willingness.

So finally we found the market and were heading towards the tuna auction area, but were finding it to be incredibly difficult with people on these, um, gas powered scooter / wagon combo things that were buzzing all over the place, threatening to run over the baka gaijin (us - stupid americans) looking to be tourists at the auction. After rangling through the maze to the visitors observation area and avoiding any major collisions with these "mighty cars," we made it. And it was good. Tom and I got some really good pictures of the fish and the auctioneers - who were quite entertaining, much more so than American auctioneers. Just imagine, auction speek in Japanese with animated, often bouncing auctioneers. It was awesome. And surprisingly enough, it didn't smell fishy. Oh and we saw a dude hooking fish around with an Illinois Phys Ed. sweatshirt on that made us giggle a bit. Tee-hee.

After the fish market, we were hungry and in search of substance. Lawrence, Tom and I led the pack back over to the place we wondered to before we headed to the fish market and found a little counter restaurant with room enough for the seven of us to sit down and eat. Since we were just at the fish market, we decided to get some sushi and let me tell you - it was otherwordly. First off though, we had some ocha and miso with clams that really hit the spot on the rainy and wet day. Then I got some maguro that was just incredible - and cheap too! Just imagine, we were eating some incredibly fresh tuna that was probably crap to the people who were serving it to us, but to us it was the best sushi ever. S'alright with me - if that's crap then serve it up, kudasai!

Bellies full and feeling a little less crabby, we headed on an adventure to trade in our foreign rail passes vouchers for actual rail passes which led us on a wild goose chase around Tokyo station and eventually to stand and wait in front of a ticket office for 45 minutes only to find that we were in the wrong place and didn't need to wait at all. Then, we had to find the other place, which we did eventually, but not until after we wondered all over creation (see above sidebar). Finally, we found the rail pass exchange place, got our rail passes and headed out into tokyo station for some tea and some place to sit down. We stopped in a little cafe that didn't seem too pleased with our being there, ordering one coffee (ko-he) at 420 yen and the rest getting ocha (green tea). You see, green tea is usually free here, so I can imagine why they were annoyed. Oh well, my feet hurt and there was no place to sit down in the station before the turnstyles (or what passes for turnstyles in japan - they're much more high tech as you can imagine). The best part of this little side adventure was finding a Beard Papa's cream puff stand and getting ju-ni banira onegaishimasu! I've gone on about cream puffs in the past, but seriously, the Japanese know how to do cream puffs.

Ready for some rest, we headed back to the hotel and on the way back in ran into Zack and Lawrence , who were heading out looking for lunch and asked Tom and I if we wanted to join them. Lunch sounded good so we embarked on a wild goose chase for 'this one ramen place around the corner.' After walking for 45 minutes, we didn't find the ramen place, but we did see some really great sites and a cute little shopping district. Finally, we gave up and headed to Hiro-o where we found a little chinese place with 4 seats and big bowls of ramen. I love noodles. This isn't the top ramen from back home, oh no. This is magic soup, and also inexpensive. I got some ramen with some tonkatsu (fried pork tenderloin) on top. And it was good.

Bellies full with warm ramen goodness, we headed back to the hotel but this time took 'the back way' which led us down a cute little side street, past a concrete shinto shrine, and some apartments. Lots of great things to see, and of course, plenty of vending machines. I needed to work on homework and take a shower, so I did both of those things while Tom went with Zack and Lawrence to exchange rail passes. I must reiterate that it sucks super hard to have to do homework while I'm in Japan, but I've got it pretty good. I've figured out a way to put the video taped lectures on my ipod so that I can listen to them while we're in transit. Thus far, I've been fortunate to have internet connectivity in every hotel we've been in too, so I'm able to hand in my homework and get course documents from the web, etc. Besides, skipping a whole quarter for 2 weeks out seems a bit absurd. Such is life.

The boys came back and we hung out a little bit before heading out to dinner at a gyoza place. Gyoza are potstickers and pure awesome in food form if you can find a place that knows their gyoza. And this place did, so we ordered double. Zack and Lawrence had ramen, again, Tom had noodles (not ramen soup, but just noodles) and vegetables, and I had miso glazed beef with peppers, onions, and of course, sticky white rice. Heaven. And this is supposed to be crap food? Whatever.

Following that, you got it, I worked on homework while the boys went out and checked out Tokyo tower. I didn't want to see the eiffel tower replica, since I had been to the real one, and frequented another replica at Kings Island many times throughout my youth, so this arrangement worked out well. The guys came home eventually, I finished and handed in my homework, and we all went to bed since we had to get up super early the next morning for our trip to Nagoya. 4am local time, to be exact. Since we needed to pack up our stuff and sort out what we wanted to take in our small bag with us and what we wanted to store at the Sanno while we were away, we needed some extra time. And God forbid we be late. So Tom and I dragged ourselves out of bed, got our stuff separated and packed and were in the lobby to meet everyone else at 5:45 am, 15 minutes before our 6am meeting time. And we waited. and waited. The rest of the crew, Sean and Cassie, Lawrence and Zack where down at around 5 after 6. and we waited. At around 6:25, the parents made it down, stored our luggage and we all headed out.

Tom and I shared a bag, so he rolled / carried that around. I'm glad we made this arrangement because this freed up my hands to carry my mom's bag, which she wouldn't have been able to haul up and down the stairs throughout the subway and rail system, despite her rampant stubbournness. So we headed out around 6:35 am, which posed a bit of a problem since our Shinkansen train was leaving from Shinegawa station at 7:14, 2 transfers away from us. And thus, we hauled ass. Naturally, no one had consulted a map before we left, so there was much confusion as to which route we would take. We figured it out and ended up at Shinegawa, but had no idea which platform we were on or where said platform was. Following his gut, Tom lead us down a hallway, but was called out. We wondered around for another five minutes until I found a map and lead us towards the hallway that Tom was trying to take us to. We arrived at the platform just as the shinkansen arrived. I busted out in full on city walking mode and made it to car 9 before I had to give up, get on the train, and walk the rest of the way inside or it would've left without me. Sweaty, tired, seriously cranky, We made it to our seats, not pleased at all but happy to be on the train.

The shinkansen ride was incredible, the scenery was beautiful and there was much picture taking on the way, despite all of the dripping sweat drying on our backs. Eventually we made it to the Nagoya station and hopped off the shinkansen. Fortunately for us, we'll avoid many of the aforementioned time crunch issues since our hotel, the four star Nagoya Marriot Associa Towers, is located directly above the train station.

Hallelujiah.

After making it to the hotel,high up in the towers above Nagoya were the lobby is on the 15th floor, Mom and Larry checked in but our rooms weren't ready yet, so we stored our luggage. Unfortunately, Cassie, who has a fear of hights, thought it would be a good idea to peer out of the sky lobby windows to see the panoramic view and instantly sent herself into a phobia related panic attack. Naturally, she was whisked away to lower floors while she calmed down while the rest of us made plans for the day. With the help of the hotel manager, I got some directions on how to get some baseball tickets for the Chunichi Dragons vs. Hiroshima Carps game and Tom and I headed out to buy the tickets. Fortunately, the hotel manager wrote down on a piece of paper, the kanji for baseball tickets, Nagoya dome, and 10-3, which became incredibly handy. A local Sunkus convenience store was selling the tickets so, with the patience of the store clerk, we were able to buy some and headed back to the hotel to meet up with the rest of the gang. According to some, we were being inconsiderate by heading out to get the tickets, but I still don't comprehend why.

Following that, we checked into our rooms and boy are they nice. Although the bed is a little firm, this is top notch, and from the 41st floor (above the blinking 'do not hit this building with your airplane' lights)the view is breathtaking. The toilets here are high tech too. The one that I went to in the lobby had all kinds of buttons on it. While the one in our room isn't as decked out, it still has a bidet and something else with an icon that can only be translated as "butt shower." Mom was trying to show Lawrence how it worked and got a splash in the face. Apparently it has more uses than what we originally thought!

After check in, it was lunch time and the 8 of us looked for lunch plans. I discovered that on the 12th and 13th floors, there were a bunch of restaurants. However, Cassie was still freaking out about the heights thing (despite the restaurants being inside) so we opted to find other arrangements. On the basement floors, there was a food market, but it was mostly sweets, breads, and a grocery store. After coming up with nothing, we opted to split up with Tom, myself, Lawrence and Zack heading to the 12th and 13th floors looking for some food. We ended up at a Korean place where we had more gyoza, a picther of Kirin Ichiban, and some incredible bibimbop. I guess the other half of the gang ended up at a pasta place. Not noodles, pasta. To each their own.

Tom and I wondered around and got some snacks and headed up to our room. We at our snacks and watched some Japanese tv where we saw a show where one woman proclaimed another woman to be a Bee-mbo desu! Oh my! After a knitting show, a kids show, and some 'learn english with this goofy looking american guy' show, we headed to the baseball game. Again, since the train is directly below our hotel, it didn't take much to hop on and head out the the Nagoya dome.

At first, it didn't look much different from a normal baseball stadium, but when the game started up, you could definitely tell the difference. I will never view baseball in the same way again. These people are enthusiastic about their baseball! And the beer! Oh man, sapporo, kirin, and asahi dudes running up and down the aisles. You know how big those beers are - 550 yen which is roughly 4-5 bucks a beer. Now we're talking. And the cheers! Everyone would cheer and take their two little plastic bangy sticks and hit them together to the beet of whatever cheer is currently being sung. Kattobase clank, clank, clankclankclank is one of the popular ones where kattobase means 'get on base' or 'get a hit'. Tom and I had some soba, but we also gave their version of hot dogs a try. Tom liked it, but I didn't. It was on a french roll type bun, had stadium mustard, and cabbage with some sort of sweet sauce. The hot dog tasted fairly similar to an american hotdog, although something wasn't quite right. I'll stick to noodles and bento, thanks. Another remarkable thing was that just about everyone stayed after the game was over to watch a little presentation of some sort and sing more cheers. Oh! I forgot to mention the huge flags in the stands along with some trumpets for each team and cheerleader / conductor types. Also on the field they had cute little japanese cheerleaders/drill squad that would come out and be cute at everyone every so often. They danced to a techno remix to take me out to the ballgame - cute.

Well, time is a wastin' and we're taking the shinkansen to kyoto today. Sayonara!

10.03.06 6:27pm(3 comments)