It’s been over a month since we returned from our trip, and I am finally writing our last post. It has taken a lot of time, but I am glad I did it, because, sadly, memories do fade away. I never scrapbooked our Vancouver trip in 2005 (and we didn’t have our blog back then) and now I just have a pile of pictures with vague recollections.

Anyway, back to Japan. Before I left, someone told me that once she visited Japan, she felt like she understood more about her family and herself. Her parents were actually from Japan, whereas I’m fourth-generation, so I didn’t think that would really apply to me. However, while I was there, I did find myself “relating” to parts of the culture in a strange way. For instance, inefficiency really bothers me, and as soon as we arrived at Narita airport, I could tell how efficiency is really a priority in Japan. Granted, it was a lot less crowded in Narita than LAX, but the difference between how things are handled was very apparent. Also, I have also had an inexplicable love for containers, stationery (paper, pens, etc.) and cute things (e.g. Hello Kitty). Therefore, I felt right at home shopping among the crowds at Daiso, Kiddyland, etc. It was amazing to me that the Loft could be so crowded on a weekday night, full of people looking at writing instruments. Regarding cuteness, it was everywhere, like at Mister Donut, as shown earlier, and on the street in a construction zone:

I also enjoyed the attention to detail. Like on one of the trains, there were seats reserved for handicapped, pregnant, those with infants and the elderly. They had cute signs, but also, the seats were upholstered in fabric with cartoon outlines depicting those categories of people. I should have taken a picture, but didn’t.

Some other random observations.
When it was raining, some stores had these umbrella-bag contraptions to make it easy to bag your own umbrella and prevent it from leaking everywhere.

Vending machines are literally everywhere. We had fun trying new drinks out.


Pocari Sweat, anyone? Tastes like Gatorade.
Our favorite was C.C. Lemon.

70 lemons worth of Vitamin C in every bottle! The Japanese are also seemingly obsessed with recycling. Every place we went to had separate receptacles for “combustible” and “non-combustible”.

It took the longest time for D and I to get used to walking on the left side of the street. Walking on the right is just something we take for granted. It was also weird to see the crosswalk guy walking to the left instead of the right. (See picture below):

The addresses in Tokyo are basically of no help. It is frustrating, since you would think that the Japanese people would demand some sort of ordered system. The streets in Kyoto are easier to navigate, but some of the names are a bit daunting.

Now, that’s a mouthful.

All of the public bathrooms I went to were remarkably clean. Some even had a toilet brush, along with instructions on how to clean the toilet area yourself. I couldn’t help but think that Japanese people must be grossed out when they go to most public bathrooms in the U.S.
Most places we went to had high-tech Western style toilets. However, there were a few places where I had to use the infamous pit toilet.

The most challenging experience was using one on a moving train!

Finally, we had fun looking at all the different snack foods. (My sister writes more about these on her blog). Some we bought were Kit Kats, including Hachiya tea flavor, citrus flavor, and a special dark-crunchy flavor:

D’s co-worker said this box states it is for “Adults only”. I guess kids don’t like dark chocolate?

Meiji Mango Chocolate (the kids loved this).

Crunky Ball Nude.

Gotta love that name.

We also liked Chip Star, which is like Pringles, but comes in a consomme flavor.

So, I kind of veered off topic, but just to wrap up, Japan is a fascinating country, and we will never forget our experience there. We would encourage anyone who is debating whether to go to go for it. I was worried about not knowing the language and navigating the transportation system. We literally used two words: “Arigato” (thank you) and “Hi” (yes) and got along just fine. We did, however, do tons of research beforehand, which was immensely helpful. But we actually enjoy doing stuff like that. You should see the notebook we put together full of directions, reservations, etc. Hey, that might be another post for the future.

Wow…we finally reached our last day. We first walked back toward Kyoto station to grab some breakfast. We were eyeing Donut Planet, but ended up just down the way at DeliFrance. We shared a cafe latte, cranberry bun and egg/bacon bun.

After we bought our food, they brought out green tea churros! D had to try one, but it turned out not too special.

Outside, people were lined up, waiting for something. We tried to ask the person working at the bakery if she knew what they were waiting for. We couldn’t really understand her, but I think she said it was a video game doll, or something like that.

Must have been one special doll!

Afterward we walked to Higashi Hongan-ji Temple.

Next we walked to Nishi Hongan-ji Temple.

While the buildings themselves were impressive, I am sure they would have been a lot more interesting if they had spiritual significance to us. Obviously, they didn’t, so I wasn’t too sad that we were only able to visit two. Also, both of them were fairly close to our ryokan, so it wasn’t out of our way.

Mid-morning snack:

More green tea ice cream!

After picking up some souvenir snacks at Circle K, we picked up our bags and walked back to Kyoto station. We shopped a little, and then ate at Wako Tonkatsu, located in Eat Paradise, a group of restaurants in Kyoto station.
Tonkatsu (fried pork cutlet) was the last food item on my list of “foods to eat in Japan”.


This was also our most expensive meal of the trip. I would say the price for lunch was reasonable, though (we just ate pretty cheap everywhere else). I think the set was around $15 and it came with free refills of miso soup, cabbage and rice. (We didn’t even have room for any refills, though). The tonkatsu was just how I expected…light and crispy. We tried the leaner cut and fattier cut and I preferred the leaner, even though it was not as juicy. It was a satisfying meal to end our trip.

We took the shinkansen back to Tokyo/Narita and boarded our plane without any problems. The plane home was a lot more full, so we had another person in our aisle. The trip was also a lot shorter (due to headwinds) and we weren’t served as much food, but it was still plenty. We are very grateful that we had the opportunity to travel, and especially grateful that my parents were able to take care of the kids. I think I need one more post to discuss my observations of Japan and post some random pictures that didn’t really fit into any of our previous posts. Stay tuned.

We were anxious to get back to our room to change into dry socks. We took a crowded city bus and had to stand up. (Surprisingly, this was probably the most crowded transportation situation we faced during the entire week). D and I were talking to each other (can’t remember about what) when a younger guy asked where we were from and whether we had come to Japan before or after the earthquake. Turns out that he was Chinese, but a university student in Japan studying engineering. He spoke English very well and we ended up talking all the way back to our ryokan. He asked us our names so he could look us up on Facebook. When we asked his name, he responded, “My Chinese, Japanese or English name?” Haha. Anyway, Bell, if you’re out there, hope you’re enjoying reading about our Japan experience.

I first read about the Capsule Ryokan on TripAdvisor. It was the highest rated hotel in Kyoto! While it is certainly not for everyone, it met our needs just fine. However, if the kids had come with us, it would be a different story.

First of all, it was tiny. The room was literally the size of the bed plus one foot on the side and just enough room for the shower and toilet.

This was actually the larger-sized ryokan style room. They also have capsules, which are basically enclosed beds. I wonder whether I would feel claustrophobic in one of those.

We had to marvel at the efficiency of the use of space, though.

Under-bed storage.

Another reason why this place would not be for everyone…the shower was literally at the foot of the bed.

I liked the high-tech look of it. The toilet was also cool. The cover automatically opens when you open the door and closes when you shut the door. It also had all of the heating elements/sprays/jets/flushing noises that you could ever want.

The room had a wall-mounted t.v.

It really made us think about how little room one actually needs and how much we live in excess.

For dinner we walked to Kyoto Station, which has tons of shopping and restaurants.

At the top of these stairs is a “Ramen-town” with a bunch of ramen restaurants that represent different parts of Japan.

It was difficult to distinguish between the different restaurants, so we just chose one that looked fairly busy/popular. We bought our tickets at the vending machine outside (with some difficulty) and enjoyed steaming bowls of ramen. Interestingly, it had a more beefy, rather than porky flavor.

We were also excited to see that there was a Mister Donut at the station.

Love this kawaii ad campaign!

Strawberry and blueberry. The blueberry was much better.

There are so many varieties, I wanted to try them all. After being there a couple of times, I would definitely recommend the Pon de Ring and anything with a filling or cream. The plain ones were a bit too plain.

Afterward we walked to the Kyoto Granvia Hotel, which is connected to the station. We went to the top floor where there is a nice view (for free).

Finally, we did a little shopping. D bought some omiyage for the people at work (rolled green tea cookies). I was curious about these won-ton shaped mochi treats. I picked sakura, which was interesting. However, I think I probably would have enjoyed the chocolate better.

Too bad they didn’t have a variety pack!

So, that was our exciting Kyoto night-time adventure. We watched a little Japanese t.v. and were ready for our last day.

We were feeling tired and wet, but we were determined to go to our last sight-seeing stop in Kyoto: the Golden Pavilion. I am glad we did go, because it was truly a spectacular sight.

More school kids on field trips.

Walking around Japan, we hardly saw any women in kimonos. There were a few hanging around the Golden Pavilion for some reason, however.

I’m keeping this short because this weekend has been pretty exhausting. My hope is to finish blogging about this trip this week! I know, it seems to have taken forever.

Looking at the map, we thought the Imperial Palace would be about a 15-20 minute walk from Nijojo Castle. Unfortunately, our estimate was way off. The streets were longer than we expected. Once we reached the palace grounds, there was still a LOT more walking to do. I sent D to go ahead so we would have some chance of making the appointment for our tour. Luckily, the tour starts with an introduction while you sit in a room, so the group was still there when we arrived.

This was the only official tour we went on during our trip. It was still raining, but our tour guide said some people think the gardens are even prettier in the rain. We were not allowed inside any of the buildings, but the structures themselves were impressive. I felt like I was on a movie set.

The Emperor’s Garden

I never realized that Japanese gardens are set up to resemble landscapes. The trees in the background are supposed to be the mountains. The rock in the foreground is an island.

By this time, we were pretty wet, but we had one more stop on our whirlwind tour of Kyoto…

We stopped for a quick snack of momiji manju (maple leaf shaped cake with red bean filling). Miyajima is known for these, and there were tons of different shops selling them. The momiji manju machines were fascinating. We were able buy a couple of manju hot off the press.

This place was cute. There was a tiny seating area, and they had free tea.

There were two choices, skin on and skinless bean filling. I thought I would like skinless, but it turns out I like the texture of the skin on better.

Other places had other fillings like chocolate and custard. There was also a place that sold deep fried momiji manju on a stick, which my sister and BIL tried.

Hello Kitty Momiji Manju!

Next we took the ropeway up Mt. Misen. We bought a one way ticket and planned to hike down.

Whaddayouknow? Another pictorial map!

I had read there were wild monkeys at the top of the mountain. These signs would certainly indicate that is the case.


And my personal favorite:

However, no monkeys were to be seen 🙁 There was a nice view of the Seto Inland Sea, however.

We started the trek down and realized maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to do the one way trip. I especially felt bad for K, who had j on his back! Fortunately, it was not a hot day. After tons of stairs (some of which were a bit treacherous), we finally made it down the mountain. Someone told us it would take about an hour, and I think that was about how long it took!

j was a trooper!

Having worked up a good appetite, we were ready for lunch. We found a place serving Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki, so we thought we should give it a try.

Here is the front window display complete with a diagram and felt model. Love it!

Unlike regular okonomiyaki, which has all of the ingredients all mixed up, Hiroshima-style is carefully cooked in layers. It takes some skillz!

The final result was delicious, all the more so because we were so hungry. We split two among the four of us.

I also appreciated that they didn’t cover it in kewpie mayo as I have had on previous occasions. I think we have a new food truck concept!

After we finished, we saw a place selling Hiroshima buns right across the way, so we gave them a try too. Beef or conger eel? Beef, please.

These were very hot, temperature-wise. I imagine they would be really good on a cold winter day.

To top it all off…one green tea soft serve. D really liked this one.

Finally, we saw the world’s largest rice paddle:

Impressive.

I think we returned back to my sister’s place around 3 p.m. My sister and I then headed back out for a brief visit to a nearby fabric store. (Very exciting, about five floors of sewing/craft supplies). My BIL showed us his Japanese cooking by making beef-rice bowls for dinner. Yum. Also, we learned that Lawson’s (a popular convenience store chain) makes a mean tiramisu. Who knew? We briefly considered going out on the town after dinner, but decided to take it easy. This was probably our most relaxed day of the trip, and we needed it.