Captain’s log...... our boeing 747 has sustained minimal damage from the clingon attack we will have to stop and refuel our gullets in Australia and gather provisions as well as take in the local sites.............. (Star Trek was great!!!)
Our flights from Tokyo International left at similar times but where our oneworld tickets predetermined that we have a stopover at Brisbane to then catch an internal flight to Cairns using the infamous Qantas Airlines, the Mac would take their sister company Jetstar straight to Cairns. As Bernie would land in Cairns first we were expecting him to have a taxi upon arrival ready to drive us to our booked accommodation. Of course not even the simplest of arrangements went according to plan. Having arrived at the domestic terminal we were expecting Bernie to be waiting at the arrivals area preferably with a bottle of the fizzy stuff. We waited 15 mins and collectively we reached to the same conclusion that Bernie had not even thought about coming to meet us at the domestic terminal and to be more precise that he hadn’t even made it outside. As we walked to the international terminal which for the record was deserted we found the Mac curled up in the corner of the waiting area catching some shut eye. Let us hope that Bernie never becomes prime minister of Nigeria as he is so predictable that an assassin wouldn’t need much of an IQ in order to get in the mind frame of his target.
Ok we were all in a gigantic ford falcon on our way to Gilligans Backpackers Cairns. As we drove from the very small Cairns airport into town I must say that I was not impressed at all with the area even less the architecture. This is Australia, a country which didn’t even exist until 300 years ago when a Captain Cook came across New Zealand in search of the mythical southern continent. I would try my best to take a neutral stand point and to put my experiences with Australians in London to one side.
I had never really thought about what to expect from Australia, of course beer would play a dense role in the grand scheme of things. Seriously I thought the east coast of Australia was one long sandy beach. I will address this later!. Having spent 3 days in Cairns which in my opinion was 2 days too long, there isn’t really much to say. There is nothing to see in Cairns but I hear there is much to do apart from going on the taky pub crawls which make you guzzle cheap alcohol and perform sex positions with strangers (which for some of the readers i.e. Dom Adlem is bliss). In fact the beach area makes some of the worst stretches of coast look more appealing. What they do instead which completely bamboozles me, is to you use a manmade lagoon which overlooks the coast. We went out every night in Cairns, it was really “the same shit but different toilet”. The hostel was really nice especially for the price we paid, with the inclusion of Bernie searching for rooms for 4 is really economical and relatively easier.
I guess some of the aristocratic snobbery from backpackers in Japan had rubbed off on us and we rented a very decent car instead of travelling with the rest of the cattle on the Australian Greyhound busses. Having two black men with a say on the vehicle of choice proved difficult, where Mark and I wanted space and practicality, Bernie and Weli wanted rims and hydraulics. We wanted Toyota Corrolas and they wanted 4x4 Jeeps. Well we settled for a Toyota Sportivo Camry, it was a dam nice car, I am writing this having just rented a Toyota Yaris. We had an intricate plan for our east coast experience. We would drive to Arlie Beach and visit Whitsunday Islands times two nights then drive to Brisbane time 2 nights and finally Byron Bay times two nights before returning Bernie to Brisbane Airport where he would return to Europe to talk of his travels. This did not happen, not even close in hindsight what we did proved to be much more beneficial for Bernie. Australia is huge this cannot be underestimated having driven well over 7000km I really appreciate its size. We drove for 4 hours to Townsville where we stayed in a really nice hostel for one night before setting out to Arlie Beach. The hostel had a great atmosphere down to the individual who ran and maintained the building. His name escapes me but he definitely made us feel right at home instantly.
The drive from Townsville to Arlie beach was a monster. As Russian KGB from Rounders famously said “he lays down a monster.... the f@ck you lay that down”. Guys the road infrastructure in Australia is woeful making an English country land look like route 66. Along the east coast of Australia we have pretty much one road connecting the towns such as Cairns and Townsville in the North with the more prominent cities such as Newcastle, Sydney and Melbourne in the South. This route is known as the Pacific Highway or alternatively Bruce Highway. Now the word Highway has been desecrated on every Australian road sign because by definition a highway is surely a free flowing road i.e. dual carriage way similar to our motorways in England. To be more truthful the roads are terrible making the long journeys such as Brisbane to Sydney. The road is ancient and passes through every settlement and town along the east coast which results in numerous variable speed limits. For instance you leave a relatively small town and find yourself cruising at a comfortable speed (120kmh) to then suddenly be told to reduce to 30 as it is a school zone. This occurs time after time making road rage an everyday occurrence here down under. For my second rant I shall focus my attention on the criminals that call themselves car rental companies mainly Hertz, Avis etc. The area of the rental agreement that I will address in this entry is “Young Person Surcharge”. By definition this surcharge is applied to all customers under 25 years of age. This has no bearing on the experience of the driver, simply age. I am fed up of paying a young person’s surcharge to the crook rental companies. I have news for them; I am 25 in October which means they will never claim that extortionate charge from me ever again. So where were we, oh that’s right Brisbane would be the scene of radical sports. The trip from Arlie Beach to Brisbane was broken up and segmented with failures and successes to tediously boring to discuss.
We rented a place near Story Bridge in Brisbane in a backpackers place called Bunk, very nicely nestled in Chinatown. Did you know 1 in every 3 people are Chinese? The apartment was more like a bachelors pad and perfect for the four of us to hold foreplay (predrinks) before nights out. I have failed to mention the sessions of pro evolution that were had, alas that is a story for another blog entry. Whilst Mark and Weli spooned each other in their quaint queen sized bedroom, Bernie and I wondered the streets of Brisbane. We walked a couple of km over Story Bridge and caught a ferry across the River to the CBD, the weather was perfect and the site line was great. We got off at the CBD terminal which had great early 1900 colonial architecture very Pall Mall like. Brisbane has a very wholesome feel to it, a great place to live. By wholesome I mean very clean and pleasant. A farmers market was being held that sunny Friday afternoon it made me miss home. We both indulged on huge German sausage style hot dogs with plentiful amounts of sour crout. We simply just got lost in Brisbane which in all honesty is quite hard to do. After picking up a free tourist map we saw that the infamous XXXX beer brewery was close by. We didn’t hesitate and we made haste to the brewery where we booked for two on the brewery tour. It was an insightful tour giving a comprehensive history of beer from its origins right up to present day production. I think it is something that all beer lovers should read up on. For example do the phrase “he got away scott free” originates from the Tavern days in England where a scot tax was charged on all beer consumed within the London region, therefore people who consumed beer in the countryside were said to have gotten away scot free. You live and learn.... and then die and forget it all.
Bernie’s holiday was coming to a closure and I could tell that he wasn’t completely happy with his trip in the sense that it missed an extraordinary event. This was swiftly dealt with once we had booked the ultimate skydiving experience over Brisbane. We would drop 14,000 feet, which is approximately 60 seconds of free fall from an aeroplane. I cannot speak on behalf of Weli and Bernie but for me it was an amazing experience and I will struggle to describe it thus I have decided to leave it to all your imaginations or alternatively you could check out my dvd. It all happened so fast, one minute we were looking at the brochure the next minute we were getting in a propeller plane painted green with a dragons face climbing rapidly to the desired altitude. Bernie dived first, then all of a sudden I see Weli being thrown out like a bag of spuds, one second he is there the next he is gone. Shit I am next...........That was the pinnacle of Bernie’s visit for me and I am guessing that Bernie feels the same way. The remaining time we had in Brisbane consisted mainly of site seeing and walks around the city. The plan was to drop Bernie at the airport and for Mark and I to drive to Sydney where we would return to London for 10 days. As they say the rest his history.
Saturday, 30 May 2009
Wednesday, 27 May 2009
Tokyo by Filipe Martins
The short stay in Shanghai was due to Mr Bernard Molokwo arrival from London to Tokyo. We were to catch Japanese Airlines for the first time; it would prove to be a nice insight to JAL as we would be taking a considerably longer flight to Cairns 10 days later. Tokyo airport was a stylish airport typically found in 1st world countries following the usual architecture found on most new international airports across Europe. Once we had landed we all switched our mobile phones on inside the plane to find that UK mobile phones do not work in Japan. A new dilemma developed, how would we communicate with Bernard once we had passed immigration?. Not too concerned at first as Bernie was due to land at least one hour before us, so we presumed that he would be waiting for us at the exit. Bernie’s plane landed a clear one hour before our flight to Tokyo yet he managed to be a clear 45 minutes later than us in reaching the exit. We had asked the young lady at the information desk to do a call out for a one Mr Bernie Mac to no avail.
Once we were all together at the departures exit, the Tokyo holiday was to begin. Our first exposure and experience with the powerful Japanese Yen would occur instantly. We had been monitoring the exchange rate for almost 4 months. We had heard numerous nightmare stories from the very few backpackers who had ventured to Japan of the high cost of living. A taxi from the airport to Tokyo central would be 130£, that is right pound sterling. We made the conversion various times as we felt we may have made a fundamental error. It was in fact the cost so we pursued other avenues. We took the fast train instead taking us to Shinjuku central station, a place we would become more and more familiar with. Japan is a well run efficient machine, the level of organisation is unbelievable and warrants a 16 hour flight from London Heathrow. The trains are beautiful with modern stations to match. The train map looks more like a big bowl of spaghetti Bolognese, being very complicated at first. The sheer number of stations on the network is mind blowing. It put Bernie the transport for London engineer in a gay state.
We had a gay old time on the train to central Japan, excuse the second use of the word gay. We talked about our plane journeys to Tokyo, the extortionate taxi costs and other such educational discussions that we have become accustomed to (bullshit). When we arrived to the capsule hotel we were all anxious to see what they would be like. A warning I would give to anyone travelling to Tokyo who is planning on sleeping in affordable accommodation, make sure you book in advance as there is a distinct shortage of cheap accommodation so demand is high. The capsules were a bit old and where placed in a room as opposed to stacked perpendicular into the wall. Each capsule was fitted with a radio, reading light and a television. On the right hand side would be a panel with a number of buttons which would control all the gadgets. Although quite old these capsules 15 years ago would have been at the vanguard of technology.
Bernie brought with him a new lease of life that the group desperately needed, this manifested itself in the form of drinking in bars. Tokyo has a real city nightlife, it resembles more of a London nightlife than one in Bangkok. The main streets are a cocktail of neon lights each club competing with their rival neighbours for the attention of passersby. The two areas that posses the main bulk of Tokyo’s nightlife are Rompongi and Shinjuku respectively. The Japanese Rail Pass would be the best manor in which we could discover Japan, very similar to the Inter Rail Pass in Europe. I will now issue a warning to all who intend on visiting Japan or those who are even in the imaginary stage of planning such a trip. YOU CANNOT BUY THE JAPANESE RAIL PASS IN JAPAN. It sounds ludicrous that you cannot buy a rail pass giving you privileged access to a wide range of bullet train services at a discount rate to the majority of Japan. The individual costs of individual journeys would mean we would have to resort to mugging old very wealthy ladies or carrying out more traditional bank robberies. We all agreed that we would stay in Tokyo and enjoy city life. This little technicality really confused me; apparently you may buy a voucher i.e. from an accredited Japanese tourist office which may then be exchanged in Japan for said Rail Pass. This in my opinion is a trap, how on earth was I to be knowledgeable on such technicalities.
Our trip to Japan very luckily coincided with the infamous cherry tree blossom that is widely celebrated across all three islands. It is truly a perfect site that all should see, I would recommend going for a stroll through Yoyogi Park where all the youngsters and students celebrate the blossom by having parties involving large quantities of alcohol. There is a magnificent mood during the 5 or so days during the blossom. Site seeing consisted mainly of getting lost in Tokyo, which may I add can be achieved with considerable ease. We visited the palace and various museums i.e. science, history etc. Tokyo is littered with fast food joints on every single corner, they are very different to ones found in London. On top of the McDonalds and Starbucks there is also sushi, tempora soba and generic Japanese fast food places. The ticketing system I find makes the whole experience even faster as the name suggests “fast food”. One select his or hers meal at the machine and insert the money where a ticket it then issued. You must then proceed to handing the ticket over to the chef behind the counter who will have a noodle or rice based dish served up in front of your eyes in minutes. You will never pass a Japanese fast food joint and find it completely empty, no matter the time you are guaranteed to find a Jap slurping noodles away, with his face buried in the bowl.
Sushi dominated my Japanese diet heavily, as I took every opportunity to eat sushi. I was on a suicide mission to overdose on the stuff. The best sushi I have ever had in my life was had in Tokyo. Bernie and I after a night out in Rompongi caught the first train/metro to the famous fish market at around 5am. We had read on various websites namely wikitravel that it is a great bit of site seeing to do. We explored the fish market with great fascination, I have never seen such a variety of fish. There is mass confusion at chaos for an amateurs eye, but after an hour or so the mass chaos suddenly becomes more transparent and starts to resemble a system of pure efficiency. Little fork lift trucks pass by at rapid speed taking no prisoners, just fish. Fisherman are gutting and cutting, sellers are poking their noses and buying and finally tourists are just plainly getting in the way. The fish looked of the highest quality; I have never seen such tender red tuna fish steaks in all my life. My only regret is that I did not have a nice kitchen to take such fish to really test my culinary skills which are meagre to say the least. Instead Bernie and I had a go at tasting some of the finest sushi in Japan. Some of the most famous sushi houses can be found within the fish markets compound. There were queues running right around the corner being told that it would take at least 45mins we almost gave in, but fortunately we found the courage to soldier through. Finally we sat down at the counter similar to a bar where a lady would drop two cups of scalding hot green tea, ahhh sobering juice. The chef then commenced to make our set menu breakfast; the following experience was had with my eyes closed. The fish was exquisite and I shall never forget the coldness of the fish not from refrigeration but from the sea. The queuing seemed very worthwhile and I would not hesitate to do so again.
The second capsule experience was more what I would call a typical experience. I had always imagined capsule hotels being such that they housed 1000 people in capsules stacked in rows of 3 along long corridors. This was exactly that. Capsules in Tokyo are rarely mixed and so this proved to be a man’s world. Not just a luxury capsule where one can rest and enjoy a very quiet night’s sleep in Tokyo. It is also a spa for men, the fourth floor was an area where us men could walk around naked with hot tubs, Jacuzzis and saunas were available. I had one of the best showers up until now at the Shinjuku capsule hotel. There were beauty rooms with mirrors and every sort of product a man could need i.e. face cream, body cream, hair spray etc
I would say the failure in obtaining the Japanese Rail Pass meant that we spent too much time in Tokyo, yes there was considerably more to do but this came at a substantial cost. Tokyo is a very costly place to visit made even more so by the terrible exchange rate discussed earlier. We had a few crazy nights out in Tokyo managing to avoid the yakuza triads. One of the best nights would have to be the karaoke night. This as everyone knows is an extremely popular way that Japanese spend their soirées and I would have to say I went to town that night. In fact we all did, most places offer a room and all you can drink deals. For approximately 20£ per head you can get a room with a television, a couple of mics and a phone. It was a great night apart from the Swedish girls who were sharing the booth with us. They of course in true immature fashion had too much alcohol and thus the following occurred; drunken behaviour, incoherent conversation and plenty of vomit. I find girl slivering around in their vomit to not be a very classy affair, but who am I to judge it is all good fun in the end. These girls are exactly what I referred to previously with regards to snobbish backpackers and most backpackers who visit Japan consider themselves to be the aristocracy of backpacking. The girls attempted to speak Japanese at every possible moment; of course it was not this that annoyed me but the constant dumping of Japanese on Weli, Mark and I. We didn’t understand a word for all we know they could have been saying complete bullshit.
As the reader of this blog you may be asking yourselves “they had 10 days, why only Tokyo?” well the main reason ignoring many ins and outs and what have yous (Big Lebowski et al) Tokyo is just like London. Tokyo has a strong magnetic effect that binds you to the capital. How many relatives and friends have spoken of visiting the lands in the northern territory (Scotland & Northern England)? Now compare that number to how many that have actually gone on to visit said places. Tokyo is interesting due to the distinct original culture it possesses making it not as diverse in terms of people compared to Paris. To conclude visiting Tokyo will absorb even the most ignorant traveller i.e. football lout who has no interests except for getting drunk, violence and singing renditions of “no surrender to the IRA”. There is something for everyone whether it is the strange but familiar nights out or the wonderful world of Japanese cuisine.
Once we were all together at the departures exit, the Tokyo holiday was to begin. Our first exposure and experience with the powerful Japanese Yen would occur instantly. We had been monitoring the exchange rate for almost 4 months. We had heard numerous nightmare stories from the very few backpackers who had ventured to Japan of the high cost of living. A taxi from the airport to Tokyo central would be 130£, that is right pound sterling. We made the conversion various times as we felt we may have made a fundamental error. It was in fact the cost so we pursued other avenues. We took the fast train instead taking us to Shinjuku central station, a place we would become more and more familiar with. Japan is a well run efficient machine, the level of organisation is unbelievable and warrants a 16 hour flight from London Heathrow. The trains are beautiful with modern stations to match. The train map looks more like a big bowl of spaghetti Bolognese, being very complicated at first. The sheer number of stations on the network is mind blowing. It put Bernie the transport for London engineer in a gay state.
We had a gay old time on the train to central Japan, excuse the second use of the word gay. We talked about our plane journeys to Tokyo, the extortionate taxi costs and other such educational discussions that we have become accustomed to (bullshit). When we arrived to the capsule hotel we were all anxious to see what they would be like. A warning I would give to anyone travelling to Tokyo who is planning on sleeping in affordable accommodation, make sure you book in advance as there is a distinct shortage of cheap accommodation so demand is high. The capsules were a bit old and where placed in a room as opposed to stacked perpendicular into the wall. Each capsule was fitted with a radio, reading light and a television. On the right hand side would be a panel with a number of buttons which would control all the gadgets. Although quite old these capsules 15 years ago would have been at the vanguard of technology.
Bernie brought with him a new lease of life that the group desperately needed, this manifested itself in the form of drinking in bars. Tokyo has a real city nightlife, it resembles more of a London nightlife than one in Bangkok. The main streets are a cocktail of neon lights each club competing with their rival neighbours for the attention of passersby. The two areas that posses the main bulk of Tokyo’s nightlife are Rompongi and Shinjuku respectively. The Japanese Rail Pass would be the best manor in which we could discover Japan, very similar to the Inter Rail Pass in Europe. I will now issue a warning to all who intend on visiting Japan or those who are even in the imaginary stage of planning such a trip. YOU CANNOT BUY THE JAPANESE RAIL PASS IN JAPAN. It sounds ludicrous that you cannot buy a rail pass giving you privileged access to a wide range of bullet train services at a discount rate to the majority of Japan. The individual costs of individual journeys would mean we would have to resort to mugging old very wealthy ladies or carrying out more traditional bank robberies. We all agreed that we would stay in Tokyo and enjoy city life. This little technicality really confused me; apparently you may buy a voucher i.e. from an accredited Japanese tourist office which may then be exchanged in Japan for said Rail Pass. This in my opinion is a trap, how on earth was I to be knowledgeable on such technicalities.
Our trip to Japan very luckily coincided with the infamous cherry tree blossom that is widely celebrated across all three islands. It is truly a perfect site that all should see, I would recommend going for a stroll through Yoyogi Park where all the youngsters and students celebrate the blossom by having parties involving large quantities of alcohol. There is a magnificent mood during the 5 or so days during the blossom. Site seeing consisted mainly of getting lost in Tokyo, which may I add can be achieved with considerable ease. We visited the palace and various museums i.e. science, history etc. Tokyo is littered with fast food joints on every single corner, they are very different to ones found in London. On top of the McDonalds and Starbucks there is also sushi, tempora soba and generic Japanese fast food places. The ticketing system I find makes the whole experience even faster as the name suggests “fast food”. One select his or hers meal at the machine and insert the money where a ticket it then issued. You must then proceed to handing the ticket over to the chef behind the counter who will have a noodle or rice based dish served up in front of your eyes in minutes. You will never pass a Japanese fast food joint and find it completely empty, no matter the time you are guaranteed to find a Jap slurping noodles away, with his face buried in the bowl.
Sushi dominated my Japanese diet heavily, as I took every opportunity to eat sushi. I was on a suicide mission to overdose on the stuff. The best sushi I have ever had in my life was had in Tokyo. Bernie and I after a night out in Rompongi caught the first train/metro to the famous fish market at around 5am. We had read on various websites namely wikitravel that it is a great bit of site seeing to do. We explored the fish market with great fascination, I have never seen such a variety of fish. There is mass confusion at chaos for an amateurs eye, but after an hour or so the mass chaos suddenly becomes more transparent and starts to resemble a system of pure efficiency. Little fork lift trucks pass by at rapid speed taking no prisoners, just fish. Fisherman are gutting and cutting, sellers are poking their noses and buying and finally tourists are just plainly getting in the way. The fish looked of the highest quality; I have never seen such tender red tuna fish steaks in all my life. My only regret is that I did not have a nice kitchen to take such fish to really test my culinary skills which are meagre to say the least. Instead Bernie and I had a go at tasting some of the finest sushi in Japan. Some of the most famous sushi houses can be found within the fish markets compound. There were queues running right around the corner being told that it would take at least 45mins we almost gave in, but fortunately we found the courage to soldier through. Finally we sat down at the counter similar to a bar where a lady would drop two cups of scalding hot green tea, ahhh sobering juice. The chef then commenced to make our set menu breakfast; the following experience was had with my eyes closed. The fish was exquisite and I shall never forget the coldness of the fish not from refrigeration but from the sea. The queuing seemed very worthwhile and I would not hesitate to do so again.
The second capsule experience was more what I would call a typical experience. I had always imagined capsule hotels being such that they housed 1000 people in capsules stacked in rows of 3 along long corridors. This was exactly that. Capsules in Tokyo are rarely mixed and so this proved to be a man’s world. Not just a luxury capsule where one can rest and enjoy a very quiet night’s sleep in Tokyo. It is also a spa for men, the fourth floor was an area where us men could walk around naked with hot tubs, Jacuzzis and saunas were available. I had one of the best showers up until now at the Shinjuku capsule hotel. There were beauty rooms with mirrors and every sort of product a man could need i.e. face cream, body cream, hair spray etc
I would say the failure in obtaining the Japanese Rail Pass meant that we spent too much time in Tokyo, yes there was considerably more to do but this came at a substantial cost. Tokyo is a very costly place to visit made even more so by the terrible exchange rate discussed earlier. We had a few crazy nights out in Tokyo managing to avoid the yakuza triads. One of the best nights would have to be the karaoke night. This as everyone knows is an extremely popular way that Japanese spend their soirées and I would have to say I went to town that night. In fact we all did, most places offer a room and all you can drink deals. For approximately 20£ per head you can get a room with a television, a couple of mics and a phone. It was a great night apart from the Swedish girls who were sharing the booth with us. They of course in true immature fashion had too much alcohol and thus the following occurred; drunken behaviour, incoherent conversation and plenty of vomit. I find girl slivering around in their vomit to not be a very classy affair, but who am I to judge it is all good fun in the end. These girls are exactly what I referred to previously with regards to snobbish backpackers and most backpackers who visit Japan consider themselves to be the aristocracy of backpacking. The girls attempted to speak Japanese at every possible moment; of course it was not this that annoyed me but the constant dumping of Japanese on Weli, Mark and I. We didn’t understand a word for all we know they could have been saying complete bullshit.
As the reader of this blog you may be asking yourselves “they had 10 days, why only Tokyo?” well the main reason ignoring many ins and outs and what have yous (Big Lebowski et al) Tokyo is just like London. Tokyo has a strong magnetic effect that binds you to the capital. How many relatives and friends have spoken of visiting the lands in the northern territory (Scotland & Northern England)? Now compare that number to how many that have actually gone on to visit said places. Tokyo is interesting due to the distinct original culture it possesses making it not as diverse in terms of people compared to Paris. To conclude visiting Tokyo will absorb even the most ignorant traveller i.e. football lout who has no interests except for getting drunk, violence and singing renditions of “no surrender to the IRA”. There is something for everyone whether it is the strange but familiar nights out or the wonderful world of Japanese cuisine.
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