Japan Holiday 2023. Travelling and 'Pre-Mooning' around Tokyo, Osaka and Kyoto

Weds 22nd. Day 1 in Tokyo - Roppongi Hills, Shibuya and Minato.

      After sleeping nine hours straight, I awake to my girlfriend’s arrival. She’s been out on this side of the planet working for a few weeks before I flew over and I couldn’t be more pleased to see her.

      We head down to one of the Grand Hyatt’s ten restaurants for breakfast. It’s a hotel buffet, offering standard western breakfast options on the one side and a series of unlabelled Japanese dishes on the other. Obviously, I opt for the mystery breakfast. I’m guessing here, but it’s comprised of a fluffy omelette chopped into neat squares, cooked and pickled mackerel (not unlike escabeche), some clams that have been de-shelled and cooked in a sweet and savoury sauce, a dark steamed seaweed dish and kind of potato cake.  There is something else that I simply can’t identify - a mealy-textured, savoury porridge of some sort, perhaps? It’s all delicious and I refill my plate once more before leaving. It’s my first meal in company for a couple of weeks and I forget to grab photos.

      After breakfast, the pair of us head for a walk to a nearby park, Mohri Garden, filled with cherry blossom trees and a picturesque pond. It's a beautiful spring day, the sun's beating down on us and everything feels right with the world. Emma, an indecently well-travelled woman (perks of her job), promises to take me to Shibuya later today, for a taste of ‘real Tokyo’ and to send my jet-lagged brain into free-fall…

A word on Japanese toilets

      I’m sure it’s a cliche for tourists to get overexcited by the Japanese loo, but it’s my first time, so whatever.  Heated seats and a choice of several pressures of cleaning/drying options, all surgically targeted, make it worthy of mentioning and you can judge me all you like. 

      During the cleaning process, I let out an actual squeal and laugh for about a minute straight  (something which I will continue to do in every toilet for the next few visits).  Returning to the retrograde sanitation norms of Manchester is going to be the real bummer.

      10/10, no notes.

Shibuya

      The main square in Shibuya — supposedly the busiest city centre crossing in the world — is mind boggling to say the least. To my now dwindling cognitive function, walking through this part of Tokyo felt like an out of body experience akin to how people describe ketamine trips. I genuinely wouldn’t know, but it's a pretty funky brain vs reality scenario for which my poor head is under-prepared. Beyond the traffic, chatter and huge electronic billboard adverts, there is a steady stream of music being pumped out in to the streets - Japanese-tinged euro-dance and 80s rock with non-ironic, foot-on-the-monitor guitar and sax solos. I’m sure I could gladly stand around tolerating this racket for hours on end, but we are getting hungry and it's time to eat some raw fish for the first time this holiday. 

Lunch: Sushi No Midori, Shibuya

      The machine outside the restaurant tells us to take a ticket and wait for our number to be called. There is a queue. 

      Damnit.

      Emma promises me it’ll be worth it. Still, waiting in line, hungry and jet-lagged is not going to be the place we’ll find the best version of me. Clearly I'm not signposting my state of mind clearly enough and it's mid conversation with an ebullient (and perfectly lovely) American lady next to us in the queue, that my jet-lag truly takes hold. Polite chit-chat and niceties quickly descend into something more sinister and soon enough she is telling me about her family, her life back home, her hopes and dreams etc. In my current state, her musings are nothing more than little indecipherable word-clouds evaporating in the air between us. My girlfriend is sat far enough is away that she pretends she can’t hear and retreats into the safety of her phone. Smart. I’m dizzy now and all I can think about is lunch.

      Something is shouted in Japanese, quickly followed by 'No. 36!’. It's us, thank god. I offer my sincerest apologies to the American lady for terminating our conversation before time. Emma and me are guided into the restaurant and seated at a counter where all my impatience and fuzzed-up logic wafts away in an instant. The world makes sense again. The raw ingredients of our lunch sit in a glass display in front of us and look completely pristine. Given we are planning to eat mostly sashimi, this is a good thing. Within minutes we are devouring a selection of fatty tuna, squid, scallop, mackerel and bass-like white fish off the top of an icy mound. It is monumentally good - each fish providing its own unique taste and texture. If I have to pick, I'd say the tuna is my favourite, but the mackerel and scallops aren’t far behind. I also like the chewier squid as a contrast to the softness of the others - Emma is less convinced. To finish this supposedly light lunch, comes miso soup (excellent, clean, not especially photogenic) and a platter of mackerel sushi. Again, this is as perfect as sushi can be and the primary ingredient tastes astonishingly fresh.

      All the above, along with a couple of drinks comes to £26 for two and the two of us leave trying to imagine how much we’d have paid for sushi/sashimi of a much lower quality back home. 

Dinner: Gonpachi, Minoto - Japanese BBQ/Mixed Japanese small plates

      It’s the first evening of the trip and we meet a couple of friends and eat with them at a restaurant inspired one of the sets in Kill Bill. Neither me nor Emma have actually watched Kill Bill, so the best we could say is ‘I guess it would make a good setting for a scene in a film’. We eat various small plates - tempura, miso blackened cod, chicken thigh skewers, chicken gizzard skewers, grilled mushrooms and various noodle dishes, pickles and titbits.

      It is, again, all excellent, but I’m about to hit my daily word count and I can spare whoever's reading this a load of synonyms for ‘crispy’, ‘smokey’ and ‘delicious’.

      Day 1 proper in Japan has been a blast. 

Thursday 23rd. Day 2 in Tokyo -  Roppongi Hills.

      Leaving the breakfast buffet, I notice that I have begun to mirror the polite bowing of the hotel staff. I can’t decide if it shows a kind of thankful ‘we are equals’ respect or just looks patronising and/or sarcastic. Being in a fancy hotel in Japan, I’m a fish out of water twice over, but I’ll struggle on through it somehow.

      Rain means more of a going-out-indoors kind of day for us. Shopping, art galleries, museums, etc, with meals opted for on the fly.

Mori Art Museum, Roppongi Hills

      Right next to our hotel is the Mori Art Museum - a mix of largely contemporary installation, sculpture and video work alongside more traditional painting and photography. It's up on the 52nd floor of the building and offers a 360° view the city out on its deck - or would do if the weather was more amenable. We'll come back for the view another day (so we tell ourselves - we never do). The art itself focusses on familiar contemporary themes: isolation, dystopia, paranoia, strangeness, smallness, birth, death - all the good stuff - and is a really enjoyable and interesting hour if you like that sort of thing - which I do.  The performance artist/waiter with a bunch of baguettes tied to his face was a particular highlight, but the whole thing was effortlessly entertaining and thought-provoking.

Lunch: Kinka, Roppongi Hills - Blowtorched Sushi

      A variety of sushi worth trying is the type that has been under a quick blast of a blowtorch 'Sushi' literally translates as 'sour rice', so raw fish isn't a necessity for the dish to remain in category. In this case, the protein element of the sushi is topped with Kewpie mayo and quickly caramelised under the flame, giving off a satisfying sizzle and alluring smell. Though not a usually fan of a chef's table (busman's holiday, plus it's all just a bit of a distraction), the cooking method is kind of a novelty and fun to watch briefly. The end result is über-tasty - the fish keeping some of its fresh rawness under the heat, but with a fatty, smokey sear on the outside. Initially unsure if it would mess up the whole point of sushi (as we know it), we are both slightly surprised by how much we liked it.

     Hard recommend. 

Don Quijote, Roppongi Hills - Chicken Jerky! Assorted Kit Kats! Surprise Sex Toys!

      I'm assured a trip to a Japanese department store is a highly entertaining event and my source, Emma (obvs), wasn't wrong. It's a lot and not all of it makes sense. Don Quijote is just six floors of STUFF - one big Aldi middle aisle. Against the soundtrack of the shop's maddening custom-made theme song ('Don, Don, Don, Dooooon Quijote'),  I saw snacks, chicken jerky, meds, pets, children's toys, novelty slippers, knock-off Armani handbags, booze, snacks again and sex toys.

      When someone says they accidentally walked into a sex shop, there is probably a hint of BS about it, but we really did get in a lift on the 2nd floor, next to some chicken jerky, and get out on 6th floor into a room full of dildos, fleshlights and other assorted items people can put in themselves or themselves into.  Good luck to them - no kink-shaming or childish sniggering here, although we had to admit the gift boxed set of 'disposable' female genitalia was somewhat amusing.  

Dinner: Butabora, Roppongi Hills - Shabu Shabu

      Shabu Shabu , Japan's version of the kind of hot pot found in numerous Asian cuisines, supposedly gets its onomatopoeic name from the swishing sound made by stirring the ingredients through the broth as they cook. Cute but tenuous name aside, it's another winner. A plate of thinly sliced pork belly (half of it moulded into a rose shape) plus additional enoki mushrooms and green leaves are served next to a bubbling cauldron of broth containing more mushrooms, Chinese cabbage, tofu and daikon. Further to that, several condiments and dipping sauces are given to us: pickled yuzu, soy, peanut and sesame and a spicy, bitter fruit thing which we couldn't identify. We order additional pickles (plums, daikon, cucumber) and pork gyoza (if you don't like pork, don't go to Butabora - the chop sticks we are given have 'pork shop' emblazoned on them).

      The soup base is relatively neutral, with the condiments allowing you to season each mouthful as you go in a variety of ways. It's fun food, where each bite can taste entirely different to the last — or exactly the same if you hit upon a winning combo. There's just Emma and me eating tonight, but the communal fun of it all wasn't lost on us - it'd be a hoot with a large group. Fishing slippery bits of mushroom out of the broth with chopsticks might make for some low-level hilarity, if that's your bag. 

Friday 24th. Day 3 in Tokyo - Chiyoda City - Kokyo Gaien National Garden

      After breakfast at the hotel, we head out for a morning wander around the Emperor's Palace and gardens, about a 20 minute cab ride north from the Grand Hyatt. It's pretty closed off (post-covid measures possibly - Japan only just came out of a period of lockdown), but we enjoy a walk around the edge looking in and given it's all new information to me, I'm perfectly happy to be walking around pretty much anywhere. I have little to report really — we went there to empty our heads as much as anything else. It's pretty, quiet and a decent middle-of-the-city respite from the hubbub.   

A brief word on smoking in Tokyo

      My favourite place to smoke is into the faces of non-smokers, but Tokyo has been canny enough to make that impossible for misanthropes like me. If you want to enjoy some old-school nicotine thrills, you are looking for designated spots, in and outdoors, dotted about the city. Finding the next one becomes a fun side-mission and neatly helps you cut down while out and about, which your non-smoking partner will really appreciate. 

Lunch: Afuri, Roppongi Hills - Ramen

      Since heading there on my first night, word (and my original photo) has spread through Emma's working party about the quality of the ramen at Afuri. Apparently I'm a micro-influencer now. Sure. Anyway, we go back so Emma can try it herself. I order something different (a classic, un-spiced ramen) and it is, as is now expected, absolutely banging, though Emma assures me a creamier, bone marrow-boosted tonkotsu ramen from another vendor is the gold-standard noodle dish of Japan. It's my blog, not hers, so I'll be the judge of that.     

Dinner: Omoide Yokocho ('Piss Alley'), Shinjuku City - Yakitori

      I cannot recommend a night here enough — you should be thinking piss-drunk, not piss-urine, just incase that needs clearing up.
      We arrive at around 7.30pm and the place is well and truly bouncing. A favourite haunt of Japan’s salary men to come and unwind, every other person we bump into is hammered already.

      The food on offer is largely, but not exclusively, hibachi-grilled skewers of meat - yakitori. While regular cuts of chicken, pork and beef are easy enough to find, it doesn't take long before we are consuming something a little more interesting - hearts, livers, tendons, intestines, raw squid tentacles. I stop short of going full Bourdain and hard-pass on the still beating heart of a frog, but the variety of innards I try are genuinely delicious, offering a more interesting array of textures and tastes than the standard cuts. 

      A big point of difference down this small network of alleys is how earthy (and you can read that as scuzzy) everything is compared to the rest of the Tokyo I've seen. Vendors are ramshackle, the grills stained with a thick layer of grease and smoke. Signs are often handwritten in marker pen. Refrigeration is scant - the preferred method of keeping raw meat edible seems to be placing it next to a giant block of ice. As I said, the clientele are largely drunk and many have lit cigarettes on the go, ready to drag on between morsels, filling up these shops with a double layer of smokey fumes. There's not much space, so you will literally be rubbing shoulders with strangers. An elderly businessman crammed onto the bench beside us finds our mere presence hilarious. The language barrier prevented us ever finding out exactly why, but his regularly refilled glass of sake is probably enough of a reason, over and above any cultural faux pas we are committing.

      There's plenty of confusion — moments where we don't know exactly what animal part we are eating or whether we even ordered it. Small individual kebabs are passed our way every couple of minutes or so — there's no real ordering system, they just count up the skewers by our plates when we hold our hands up and tell them we are done.

      If any of this puts you off, you're going to have to get over yourself - the chaos adds to the unique, memorable experience that might well stay with you just as long as the perfect piece of sushi served in genteel surroundings. 

Sat 25th. Gig Day.

      My girlfriend works as a tour manager for a band and Japan is the last leg of their world stadium tour originally scheduled for 2020, but delayed for the obvious reason. While we are still travelling, I can't actually give away who it is because a small contingent of their fans tend to get a little over-excited, stalker-ish and camp outside, or might even try gaining access to their hotel. I'm perfectly aware it's highly unlikely anybody would even see this (my SEO skills aren't that good, but them's the rules).

      Emma's off to the venue with the band straight after lunch to prepare for the show this evening. I'll travel to the gig later on with a couple of guys from the band's label and their wicked-funny and über-cool manager, now in her sixties, who once worked as Nirvana's lawyer.  As the only two smokers in the party, we've become reasonably well-acquainted out on the hotel's little smoking balcony. I've concentrated very hard on not being a dick and asking too many annoying fanboy questions pertaining to her day job, but the temptation is ever-present. MAYBE SHE WOULD LIKE TO HEAR MY DEMO, NO?

      Lunch (and presumably dinner - Japanese backstage catering - let's see) will be unremarkable enough to bother writing about or photographing, but I'm looking forward to seeing how a gig goes over in Japan and seeing Emma, the band and the crew do their thing. 

   Getting to see a big rock gig from the side of the stage is a bit of a thrill. I’m given in-ear monitors - the same ones the band are using so I can listen to the mix nice and clearly, as well as some of the band and crews chatter (there are dedicated talkback mics dotted around the stage - the patter is pretty funny throughout). They play an intense, high energy, anthem-filled set to an engaged but slightly reserved audience. It's a punk festival - but the crowd are waaay too well behaved for something of that description - apparently this is fairly typical in Japan. Still, it's good wholesome fun and the band are happy with how it's all gone when they pile off stage. Their drummer is an absolute monster, btw. 

Sun 26th. Travel to Osaka

      We leave Tokyo on the bullet train to Osaka. The party we are travelling with has a fixer who helps a group of us navigate the station, without whom I’m not sure we’d have found the right platform. Emma and me stop at an Eki Ben to grab a bento box meal for the journey. The boxes are cute, beautifully designed and wrapped and full of sushi, yakitori, steamed rice, omelette, karage etc etc. 

      Once on board, we settle into our journey and open up the bento boxes. The food is pretty good, considering. The fish is fresh enough (obviously - its raw) and everything is nicely seasoned, but understandably short of mind-blowing. 

      Soon we are out of Tokyo and the scenery whizzing past switches from high rise tower to mountains and remote towns and villages between stops.  The journey is pleasant and comfortable - you really have to remind yourself that you are bolting across Japan at close to 200mph. It’s pretty civilised too - there is a well ventilated smoking room placed in the carriage right near where we are sat. I luxuriate in smokey atmosphere a couple of times during the trip, enjoying what will likely be my last cigarettes on public transport for the foreseeable. 

      After arriving in Osaka, I separate from the rest of the party to head off to the hotel alone. As I'm leaving, the singer of the band is semi-mobbed by young fans who've been following him through the station. What started as one or two, turns into a pack of about 20-30 kids, all phones out, vying for selfies. He obliges, while his bodyguard, a super sweet guy who happens to be built like a tank, does his thing and tries to fend off the crazies and stop the singer getting completely swamped. This side of fame looks disorientating and shitty, but I'd say the other stuff probably makes up for it. Yes, on balance, I think I'd like to be an internationally renowned rock star. 

Hotel - The Ritz Carlton, Umeda

      I take an hour walk through a couple of districts in Osaka to my hotel. The city is cool — not as forensically clean as Tokyo - and smoking is permitted in the street again, so 10/10 for that. People look a little less suited and booted - the whole vibe is just a bit more chill. Halfway through my walk, the weather takes a turn and I'm quickly soaked through, with 25 minutes of walk and rain still to go. After arriving at the Ritz Carlton, I approach the checking desk looking like I absolutely do not belong in this place (which I don't), but after a quick mention of my travelling party, people are fussing all over me. I think they think I'm part of the band, which I make no effort to correct. There is classical music pumping out into the corridors and silly-expensive restaurants on the first five floors - French, Italian, Japanese, Chinese and a 'bar', which is more like the brandy-and-cigars-parlour of an eccentric aristocrat's estate. Emma's and my room is up on the 32nd floor - the views are ludicrous. In fact, the whole place is a bit much - a lot of ostentatious peacocking if you ask me - I prefer the Grand Hyatt. I'll get a shower and head out for some more reasonably priced food in a bit - I'm hoping to find some okonomiyaki (dressed up savoury pancakes) or takoyaki (octopus balls) nearby.   

Dinner - Name Unknown, Umeda

      Emma’s at a gig (the last one of the tour - her holiday officially starts tomorrow), so I head out alone. I don't find my okonomiyaki, but I do find myself in a place with no English speaking waiters or menus and just kind of take a punt. I end up eating a kind of deep fried dumpling tangle, five skewers of yakitori  - all chicken, all the parts and some pickles. It's good - nothing particularly special, but cheap and satisfying. Maybe I'm getting to the point where not everything immediately blows me away just on account of it occurring. 

Monday 27th - Osaka

We take the subway head to Dotonburi to grab a snacky lunch, with the intention of finding octopus balls. Once there, it becomes clear this is not going to be a problem. There are street food vendors right down the way down the stretch of river and in at least the next two adjacent streets. People are lining up for street food in queues that I’m guessing must be close to an hour long, but using our guile and wit, we find one that has us served in under a couple of minutes.
The squid balls are delicious but disaster strikes - about once every year, my stomach becomes a delicate little flower and decides whatever I've put into myself is coming out. The squid balls hit me completely the wrong way and I wind up puking 5 minutes after eating them - not good - but I should emphasise, it's not the food, it's me at fault here. 

Dinner - Hotel, Osaka

We go for a brief walk and find me some PLAIN RICE :(. Emma enjoys a delicious looking Tonkotsu Ramen, while I get to work on my rice bowl with some chopsticks - hardly the most memorable meal, but at least I'm getting better with the local utensils.  

Tuesday 28th - Osaka (cont)

Thankfully, I'm back in the game and my stomach has stopped doing cartwheels for no good reason. We go out for lunch nearby the hotel at the Eki Marche - hit up some conveyor sushi just for the experience. As it happens, the quality is great - this is A+ fast food. 

We are heading to a Ryoken near Kyoto today, where we’ll spend a few days. The Ryokans are kind of private traditional homes built around 'onsens' - natural spring pools and baths. We'll be fed as the chef pleases and the quality is meant to be super-high. I have no intention of keeping this blog up while there, but will write about it afterwards.

Tues 28th - Thurs 30th Ryokan at Yunohana Onsen, Kameoka.

You want to stay at a Ryokan - trust me.

If you have any shred of love for yourself, you must do this once in your life. It’s not cheap, but we’ve forgone children and similar such nonsense so that we can save and spend our money on stuff like this. For what it’s worth, you will feel more unconditionally loved in one of these places than you ever will in the company of your own offspring. 

If your stay at a ryokan is anything like ours it'll go something like this:

Upon arrival, you are treated like royalty; maybe even a minor deity. People rush to attend to you, bowing and smiling. You are checked in and taken to your room, given green tea (still not my thing, but nice gesture) and rice balls with pistachio cream (very much my thing). Your shoes are taken from you and replaced with slippers for the rest of your time there. The room will be incredible - everything perfect, ornate and just so. There’ll be a yakata (kimono, basically) and traditional looking pyjamas waiting for you to slip into. You will wander around in them like some kind of flouncy louche and nobody will bat an eyelid - in fact, everyone will bow and seem thankful for the mere fact that you exist. 

You’ll have your own onsen - a large bath with a cascading waterfall feeding it, permanently refilling itself with hot spring water and ever ready to climb in. You might book into a public outdoor bath - if you are insane and want to be separated from your partner and naked with a load of strangers, or you’ll book your own private outdoor bath. We do that, under the night sky, with nothing but birds and crickets for company and it is as serene as can be. 

There’ll be massages, a freezer full of free ice cream, a TV in your ceiling above your beds, a beautiful garden view. You’ll do absolutely no exercise for as long as you are there. The place is as close to heaven on earth as I can imagine.

Then they'll serve you a meal and the whole experience will go up another level. I’ve not eaten any better in Michelin starred restaurants and for the duration of your stay, the Onsen's head chef will be cooking all your breakfasts and dinners. You won’t need lunch; a tub of ice-cream and a biscuit will do. You might enjoy them while sat in a bath - we did.  

We had four meals in total and there wasn’t a grain of salt I would change on any part of any meal I had. The meals themselves were wildly varying, from small, delicate fish and vegetable dishes, fresh sushi and salads to hearty bowls of soups, hotpots and perfectly cooked, high quality steak.

What with the food and the relaxation experience combined, you will leave feeling like a pampered A5 wagyu cow, not unlike the sort you’ll have likely eaten during your time there. 
You want to stay at a Ryokan.
Trust me.

Thurs 30th - Kyoto

We arrive in Kyoto around lunch time - after dumping our bags at the hotel, we head straight out. There’s a short time to kill before our guided walking tour begins and we are only here for 24 hours, so we go straight to our first temple, right by our hotel.

It’s huge - one of the bigger temples in the city and as such, PACKED with tourists - a problem we are only contributing to. Of course, other tourists are the problem, not us. Still, by virtue of its size, we never feel hemmed in or like processed cattle.

Our guide arrives - a sweet, knowledgable lady named Rosalina, who whisks us off to the Nishki market, a short tube ride away. Since the pandemic, what was a just collection of foodie retail outlets has now expanded into a five-block row of small restaurants, takeaways, butchers, bakers, the whole thing. Rosalina, fondly remembers the good old days, but by this point we are starving and selfishly grateful for the pandemic and all the changes it has brought. 

By the time we’ve made it down the length of the market, we are stuffed, having gorged on tempura prawns, custard and red bean paste sweets, rice and seasonings and other bits and bats - in the end, a sizeable meal made of small morsels.   

From the market we head to our guides favourite park to see some of the mostly densely packed cherry blossom trees in the area. It is blind luck that we have timed our visit to coincide with the very short (approx. 1 week) season for these amazing flowers. The photos below can't do it justice - you are missing the incredible scent and general aura of wonderment emanating from the people around you. It’s genuinely quite emotional and completely bewitching.

Dinner - Sando Food Market, downtown Kyoto and visit to Toji Temple.

Having spent the last couple of days throwing money at hot springs and exquisite food, we are now on a budget. Our guide from the afternoon recommends we head to the Sando under the Kyoto tower for a cheap but worthwhile feed, so we take her advice and head that way.
Inside we find a food market with approx 14-15 vendors all selling something unique - of course mostly Japanese, but we spot pancakes, burgers and Chinese food amongst it all. We stick with our host country’s cuisine and start with some Kobe beef skewers. There are near perfect - well hung, highly flavoured beef, cooked over coals with a subtle but complementary sauce/seasoning. There’s karage and gyoza and that’s about it - our afternoon at the market barely needs topping up before we head off to another temple - and once a year festival celebrating the Cherry blossom.

This temple visit, another recommendation for our guide, Rosalina, turns out to be another of the trip’s highlights. The buildings and blossoms of this temple have been spectacularly lit for the evening and the place feels otherworldly and a little magical - at the very least like a film set. The scale and decorative beauty of the temples is close to awe-inspiring and the natural phenomenon of the blossom when hit with dramatic lighting is spectacular.  Not for the first time on this trip, we count our blessings and head home to the hotel slightly in love with Kyoto.  

Friday 31st - Kyoto and the journey back to Tokyo

Our final day in Japan arrives. Still in Kyoto, we head to the east of the city to another temple and a famed walk - the philosopher’s path - a cherry blossom-lined river walk taken by one of Kyoto’s most famous thinkers on his daily journeys to the university there. 

Buoyed by a very good Japanese hotel breakfast, we arrive at the temple around 9am and the place has just opened, but is quickly starting to fill up with pesky tourists just wandering around aimlessly taken photos and gathering memories. Idiots. Anyway, as Emma and me take photos and gather memories, we are struck by how calm and still this one feels (in spite of the invasion it is currently under). Our own aimless meander is a joy to behold and this goes on a list of recommend places to visit in Kyoto - It’s beautiful and well worth your time. Next, the philosopher’s walk. Much like the nearby temple,  this walk is a thing of beauty - serene, meditative, relaxing, charming - all of that kind of thing and it makes for the end of a perfect morning. Did we discover the meaning of life while wander there? Maybe not, but definitely found a enormously pleasurable way to spend some of our limited time on this earth before the inevitable.  

We head back to the Sando for lunch - it’s right by the station for the bullet train. I eat the most ridiculous honey and macadamia nut pancakes (ridiculously good, but also, a ridiculous lunch to be fair). We catch the bullet train back to Tokyo and catch a glimpse of Mount Fuji on the way, grabbing a photo while rocketing past at 200mph. 

Fri 31st (cont) - Bjork, Tokyo Garden City. 

Before our flight home from Haneda, we have one last treat lined up. Emma’s close friend happens to be Bjork’s tour manager and she’s stuck us on the guest list for the final show of her Japanese tour. As a confirmed Bjork lover (who still needs winning over by her latest album), I’m delighted by this turn of events. On the way out, we stop for Chinese food of all things (soup dumplings - amazing, messy) and then grab a cab to Tokyo Garden City to catch the show.

The show is beautifully staged and performed. Alongside Bjork’s own voice is a 12 piece choir, a flute septet, a harpist, a man playing synths and samples and some kind of electric trombone and a percussionist doing everything from pouring bowls of water into other bowls (I later learn one of the mics is placed in the water) to playing a v-kit loaded with some outrageous digital drum sounds. The music is gorgeous - densely layered melodies and counter melodies, harmony and discordance, electronic and traditional instruments, occasionally all at once. Just as a song reaches its most melodious,  ethereal moment, a blast of electronic bass or static is employed, jolting the audience out of themselves and back into the moment.
I appreciate the new stuff more than I did when first listening to the album - volume and spectacle will do that - and it is a spectacle. The stage is a theatrical set of sorts, with a vocal echo chamber (disguised as a little hour) built into one side of the stage, and several carefully lit tiers running up from front to back. Throughout, projections are placed on or behind the performers. Greta Thunberg makes an appearance. Even Emma, a Bjork sceptic, is won over by the quality of the show, if not the music itself. 

That’s it for us in Japan. We head to the airport at around 6am tomorrow. Needless to say I have enjoyed this likely once in a life experience more than I could ever convey in words or photos. But this is all you have from me - words and photos - the memories are mine and Emma's alone and once we recover from the coming jet lag, we'll be able to process and treasure this trip for a long time to come. 

Mike  x.