Getting back on track

Had a real Swedish breakfast again, with cereals and fruit and jam and sourmilk. I've missed it. Got started with my Seco work. Checked my mailbox -- my tickets for Fagersta on Sunday have arrived. Will meet Boozon at the train station tomorrow and get my own keys to the apartment back. Life is step by step going back to normal. Still haven't unpacked my bags. Probably should do that before I go to sleep. Goodnight!

New haircut

Home sweet home

Asia, the epilogue

Finally home again!

As we stepped out of the train at Linköping Travel Centre we were met by the most wonderful Swedish spring afternoon. A cool but not cold breeze and a bright but not burning sun. On Arlanda I had exchanged 10 euros and 300 Czech crowns that happened to be in my purse for enough money to refill my supplies in Ryd for the next few days. Tomorrow I start working, on Wednesday comes my salary for this month's vacation and I can start living a normal life again. :-)

Let's see how long it takes to get the body clock set to an acceptable schedule. I'll start by trying to sleep now, at 22. The plan is to wake up 9h later. See you on the other side.

Wow, time flies...

Haven't had much time to update the blog since 070404, but at least I've uploaded the albums now, with some sketchy captions. I'll get round to sorting them and recounting the events of the last week once I get home. :-)

We are going for a stroll around the Peak in a short while, and tonight we are going to fly back home. I'm going to miss all the places we've been to, and of course my girlfriend, and I'm planning on going back to HK again in October.

Electric Town

Akihabara

Or plan today was to find a nice park, buy some beer and just take it easy and enjoy the surroundings. But the weather was horrible, so the plans changed.

We did our laundry, and while waiting watched Heroes. Excellent series, will have to see more of it. On WY's suggestion we then went to Electric Town in Akihabara.

We were expecting something enormous and really cool, but it wasn't really big and much of it was actually vacuum cleaners, iPod accessories, simple pocket calculators and fax machines. The Japanese electronics market is really fascinating. It's a mix of state-of-the-art gadgets and leftovers from the 80's that people still buy for some reason. Some cool stuff, though: The PS3 costs much less here than in Sweden, and it's available off the shelf. And the sound equipment was impressive, but neither of us needs an upgrade right now, and you can't really bring it on the plane.

I wound up buying some small things I've been putting off for a while – a USB hub and an SDHC (etc.) card reader. We also found a Bollywood corner, where I finally bought my first ever Bollywood movie! I went with Kal Ho Naa Ho, because I really like the most famous song from it, Mahi Ve. Couldn't find it in Sweden before (I've been looking), but here it was available for 1000 yen (€6).

We went home after a few hours and just hung around in the hostel, watching some more of Heroes and surfing.

Tomorrow after checking in at our next hostel we'll split up: Erik will go to Iwama to see a famous aikidō dōjō and I will go to the airport to meet WY.

Tokyo via Nara

Nara and arriving in Tokyo

A calm night yesterday, but we still overslept and missed breakfast. Finally arrived in Nara shortly after twelve. Locked our bags up (not an easy task in those small lockers!) and tried to find someplace to eat. Being a vegetarian in Japan is not easy, but I'm getting used to the routine. I've actually cheated some and accepted meat sauce in some cases, but this time I could get a nice noddle/vegetable soup without any compromises.

We found the Tōdaiji (Eastern Great Temple) without mishaps. It's really impressive, and also surrounded by wonderful sakura blossoms.

The Nara Park, which contains most of the sights of the city, including the Tōdaiji, is populated by lots and lots of deer. They are really tame and their main food seems to be the 'deer biscuits' that tourists buy from street merchants. The deer can easily smell if you are carrying biscuits or not, so they left us alone, but chased some of the other tourists.

The park and other parts of the city are full of sights, but we also had to catch our train to Tōkyō. We arrived without problems and returned to our previously located ATM to get the money for the hostel. We even got to the correct subway station without any significant glitches. But then we needed to find the hostel.

We tried to take a cab, because we couldn't really establish our location. But apparently our destination was out of his district, so he told us to go to the other side of the station. Then we tried to walk. And we walked and walked. Finally we ended up almost where we started and found the correct sub-town, block and building. We asked some people about the hostel, but they had no idea what we were talking about. Turns out we were in the wrong ward (town/sub-city), on the wrong side of the river. We turned the map around 180 degrees and tried again. Suddenly the roads fit the map excellently and we found the place in 15 mins.

Time to sleep.

Kyōto

Kyoto

Left for Kyōto a little later than planned, but still had time for some fun experiences.

On our way to Namba we saw groups of young people breakdancing. Tried to take a few pictures, but it was hard to capture the moment. I'll see later if the movie is any better.

Our plan was to start at Namba and then switch trains two times until we would finally get to Shin-Ōsaka, where the Shinkansen leave. We stayed too long on the first train, though, and had to go back two stations. There, by pure luck, we encountered the Kansai Airport Express, which happens to go directly to Kyōto, thereby simplifying our plans and buying us some time.

On arriving to Kyōto we decided to go strolling for a while and see what would turn up. We found the Nishi Hongan Temple, but it wasn't really Westerner-friendly signs-wise, so at first we didn't know what it was. Erik then had the idea that we should rent bikes, because the city is quite big. We asked some Westerners we met where they had rented their bikes, and after some looking we found the place and rented a bike each.

Now we wanted to go to the old Imperial Palace, which was far further away than we had realized. Good thing we had the bikes! We saw some great sakura trees there, and the outside of the enormous palace. To see the inside you need to apply for entrance at the Imperial House Authorities etc, so we didn't bother.

Our curiosity brought us to the Budo Centre shown on the map. Just before arriving there, however, Erik saw the front of a Tozando store and wanted to go in. Turns out that store actually opened today, and they had special deals on iaitō, which Erik finally couldn't resist. The owner actually was a 4-dan iaidō instructor, so he helped Erik choose a suitable sword. Since the store was just opening, they didn't have a working card reader yet, so we got a tip for a post office where we could withdraw money.

When we came out from the store, our rented bikes were gone! We borrowed the store's phone and called the rental company to sort things out. Then we decided to take care of the money thing. 50 m along the road we found the bikes again. Apparently we had been parking in a private spot. As the shop owner said: "I told you, this is Japan, nobody steals bikes!". We called the rental firm again to explain that there was no trouble and then went to get the money. The post office was closed and the ATMs inaccessible. So no sword for Erik this time. :-(

It was getting late, so we rode all the way back to the rental shop. It took us over 30 minutes! We checked when the next Kansai Airport Express would leave and spent the remaining time checking out the enormous railway station. We took the escalators to what we thought would be the top floor, only to reveal a new flight of escalators. Amazing.

On finally arriving at Namba again, we decided to see how far the underground arcade would lead. 20 minutes later we found ourselves at the subway station right outside our hostel. Once again: Amazing. When standing in the tunnel, you really can't see the end of it.

Fukuoka and Ōsaka

Fukuoka

Osaka

Fukuoka was nice. We just had a few hours between trains, so we found somewhere to eat and then went to see Canal City, a big mall with interesting architecture. There's actally a river inside the complex. We walked the area for a while, had some strawberry/banana crêpes and then went to the SEGA gaming corner and played a little more of the same drumming game we played in Hong Kong. Then it was time to move on and get on our connecting train.

We've been in Ōsaka for two days now. On the first night we went out with our roommates and some other people staying at the hostel. The destination turned out to be an all-you-can-drink bar, and our calculations showed that you would have to have at least six drinks to get your money's worth for the entrance fee. So we woke up quite late the day after.

Saturday was spent visiting the castle and seeing the Apple Store, in addition to the usual chore of finding an ATM that accepts foreign cards. We tried to find the Ramen Arcade, a whole arcade lined with nothing but rāmen restaurants, but finally settled for the first place to eat we could find. I still didn't feel very well since the day before, so I went to sleep early. Erik went out with the others "just for a short while", but finally came home in the morning. :-)

I'll go check on him now, to see if he's ready to go to Kyōto for today.