Kyoto

Woke up to the sound of my DS’ alarm at 7am. My homemade breakfast consisted of raisin bran muffin, coffee and a cheese and ham roll. A quick breakfast and shower and I’m off to Shinagawa to meet Jeh, Melissa, and Ella (My older cousin from Japan). Arrived there at 9am and browsed around for a bit. Inside train stations are tons of stores and mini marts. 9:15 rolls around and Melissa spots me at the rendezvous point. We all meet up and walk to the Shinkansen gate to head off to Kyoto which is about 325 miles away from Tokyo. Shinkansens are a class of superexpress trains that travel at about an average of 150 MPH. Now, here’s the kicker. I have a first class pass while the others have normal passes. When I bought my pass, I asked my brother which one should I buy? He said to buy the Green pass (Which is the first class pass). It’s pretty nice in first class. Relining chairs, a good amount of leg room and an arm rest. You get a personal fold out table and a footrest. That’s about it though.
After 2 ½ hours of playing with my DS, We arrived at Kyoto. Man, is it hot and humid. First things first, we headed towards a ticket office to buy day passes for the bus. Basically scattered all around Kyoto are temples and castles. However, Kyoto has been modernized significantly. So you could be walking by department stores, a six story arcade then you could pass by a temple. First stop, Hotel. Took a bus there and after we left our stuff, we went to eat lunch. The restaurants in Japan are pretty interesting. Some of them have 2+ machines at the entrance. You put in your money and press what you want to eat and it’ll print out a ticket and give you your change. A hostess is waiting for you by then and will seat you. She’ll mark the ticket and she’ll bring you your food when it’s cooked.
After a very tasty Tonkatsu and prawn tempura, we’re off to the Golden Temple. Got there easily and entered. Nothing too much to look at. You can’t even enter in it. You walk in and around it. You also walk around looking at various old structures like a shrine, a tea house, as well as some bodies of water.
It’s 5 PM when we leave the Golden Temple and headed off to Downtown Kyoto. All the tourist attractions closes at 5PM apparently. All I can say is that Kyoto has a better ratio of attractive/cute girls than Tokyo. I don’t know, it’s probably I actually haven’t been to downtown Tokyo just yet but yeah, it’s like a 2:3 ratio of attractive girls to non-attractive girls (By girls, I mean females that I think are aged 18-24). Downtown Kyoto has a prety huge street market not unlike the ones in Taiwan. At times, I forgot that I was in Japan, not Taiwan. I picked up a pair of 1-Up slippers since he Gir slippers I have are getting worn out. We shopped for a good 3 hours or so until we stopped to eat dinner. Pretty chill place. There’s a grill in the middle of the table to keep the food that’s already cooked warm. Had some grilled chicken, yakisoba noodles, some beef sukiyaki, and a Japanese pancake called Okonomiyaki. Good eats. Afterwards came back to the Hotel and here I am.

I'll post pictures later. My feet hurt.

Peace,

Iz

The mall

I woke up to the breakfast that consists of Steamed Okra, Slice fried potatoes, and a small cup of yogurt. Since I’m in Japan, I’m going to try everything at least once even though I know that I hate Okra. Well, I still hate Okra. :p But I ate it just to be polite. Afterwards, Peter and I went to Shinagawa to meet up with my Jeh (Older brother), Melissa (Jeh’s Wife), Roger (My other cousin and Peter’s brother), and Joyce (Roger’s girlfriend).
We met up and headed to Kawasaki and its mall. Now, I have to say, Japan malls put the US’s to shame. We’re talking 3 stories of Bellevue Square Mall. Also as you might have already guessed, their arcades SERIOUSLY puts Gamesworks to shame. This mall’s arcade is just as big as Gameworks. Inside it consisted of about 50 UFO catchers (Claw games) with scuffed animals from small to big, models from different anime, and candy from pocky to potato chips. The UFO catchers have a different objective than the US claw games. In the US you are suppose to actually grab a hold of the items and pick it up. In Japan the objective is to flip it into the prize hole. They purposely have a little corner sticking over the hole and you’re suppose to aim for a corner and lift it a little and when the claw lifts the prize up a little and I’ll slip out of the law and the momentum when the prize drops, it’s suppose to be enough to tip the prize into the prize hole.
Another UFO catcher game is when the prize is hanging from a ring that is dangling of a horizontal bar. You’re suppose to claw at the ring and if you claw it correctly it’s suppose to slip the ring off of the bar and it’ll drop into the prize hole. These two games are for actual stuffed animal, models prizes..
The food UFO catch’s objective is similar to the first. The food is dangling over the prize hole but it’s contained inside a capsule. You are suppose to claw at a small stuffed animal, in this case a small rabbit, and if you if it correctly, till drop into the prize hole. There is a string that is connected from the rabbit to the capsule and a yank and the capsule will release all the goodies into the prize hole.
The arcade also had Street Fighter 4 set up and I played a few rounds of it. It is very different from all the other Street Fighters. It’s a bit more slow paced than its predecessors. But all in all it’s a solid game. They also had a ton, about 40, of Tekken 6 machines set up for tournament play complete with LCD monitors that showed currently players and replays of the best players playing. They also have a quiz game that’s pretty popular. It pits you against other player in and out of the area. So, basically you could be playing against someone in the same arcade, one in New York, and Hawaii all at the same time. It’s a touch screen monitor and a big buzzer inn front of you. It’s a round robin contest between 3 other people. At the of each opponent you select a genre and he does the same. Genres include Video Games, Geography, Technology, Language, Math, Pop Culture, and many many others. Basically who has the most points at the end wins and gets recorded into your profile that is saved into a card that you use for next time you play.
The arcade also has lots of video slots, pachinko, virtual bingo that you play against other people, coin tipping games (those games where you use tokens/coins as the actual item and you’re suppose to knock other coins off the ledge). But the thing that takes the cake is the virtual horse racing. You get your own leather seat with a small table in front of you. On the table is a touch screen monitor with hi-rez graphics with tons of stats about the horses. Win records, stamina, injuries, speed, and the like.
There are tons of Gundam games as well. Some are strategy games that have the same set up as the horse racing game. Some play like Virtual-On. This is getting pretty log so I guess I’ll be quick in ending this.
Nothing else happened much. Browsed the mall for the whole day, buying a white chocolate mocha from Starbucks. All the sizes are one smaller. Vientes are Grandes, Grandes are Talls, are Tall are Shorts. Had Tempura + Noodles for lunch and Curry Tonkatsu at restaurants. Fantastic food. Got back to Iki’s house at about 9 as the rain started to really pour again. Seriously, crazy weather we’re having now.

The Alpha...

I grudgingly woke up at 9 AM after getting only about 2 hours of sleep in order for my cousin and I to get to the airport on time. Went through security like butter. The 10 hour flight went by pretty quickly. I watched a bit of Kung Fu Panda, Be Kind Rewind, and Iron Man on the plane. Played 3 player Bomberman DS and Mario Party DS with my cousin's 2 friends from his school that were also traveling with us.
When I stepped outside the plane onto Japan soil, the familiar Asian humid air around me enveloped my whole body. What a familiar feeling. That didn't last for long though as we stepped further and further into the airport. Everything in Japan is air conditioned. The trains, the buildings, and every separate room in houses as well. Well at least in Iki's, my cousin Peter's girlfriend, house.
As you may have already known, trains are the most common mode of transportation in Japan. We took about 4 different trains as well as about 5 minutes of walking to get to Iki’s house. All in all it’s pretty convenient.
Once we reached Iki’s house, it started to rain and thunder tremendously. Huge back to back thunder that shook the house. Pretty crazy. Anywho, Iki’s folks made us Curry Tonkatsu (Fried pork chop with curry sauce) which was very delicious. After a quick bath and a change of clothes, it’s currently 10PM and due to jetlag, I’m pretty tired and will try to continue posting everyday.
Peace, Izzy.