Archive for the 'Travel' Category

South Africa Pictures #1

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on September 2, 2008
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September is here, summer is over and I’m back at work already. This time last week I was in an African desert, but tomorrow I’ll be standing in front of Japanese teenagers once again teaching the past tense of irregular verbs. I got back last Saturday and I’m still jet-lagged so forgive the late posting. I didn’t have much access to the internet while away. I’m going to post my pictures in two stints and give you some accounting of the trip while I’m at it.

It was brilliant. Udo was a great guide and storyteller (though his jokes leave a lot to be desired “Gerroff the stage!“) and South Africa is a fantastic country (leaving aside poverty and crime and lingering racism and that sort of thing…). On the first day I arrived, after a short nap, Udo said “A trip up Table Mountain would be a great start” and so up we went in a cable car full of Japanese tourists with one young chap saying “sugoiiiii! sugoiiii! sugoiiii!” all the way up. We mooched around up there admiring the scenery for a bit and taking lots of pictures. Then in the evening we had dinner at a swanky restaurant at the Waterfront. And then we did something silly - drinks at the corner bar till 3 in the morning. We had a good chat but we felt rough for it in the morning. Here’s the pics (hover your mouse over them for any extra info or right click for a closer look):

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The following day, feeling worse for wear, we took things easy, visiting the beautiful Cape Town Castle (the oldest building in South Africa) and the District 6 museum. District 6 was a cosmopolitan area right in the heart of Cape Town that the apartheid regime forcibly cleared of 60,000 residents during the 70s. Now they are slowly getting their land back but the museum stands as a memorial to their experiences. That night we ate at the Ritz Hotel (the restaurant rotates!) with its magnificent night views of the city and (oops! somebody’s silly suggestion!) another late night at a Korean karaoke bar. But it was a good laugh and Udo got his mojo back apparently, which is nice (even if he did steal all my songs). Pics below (hover your mouse over them for any extra info or right click for a closer look):

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On day 3 we went to Intyatyambo which I have mentioned on this blog before (link!) and spent some time with the wee kiddies. Check out the pictures to see just how cute they are. And then fork out some cash. Just kidding. Actually, I’m not - FORK OUT SOME CASH!!! Intyatyambo is in the township of Khayelitsha, and after visiting the orphanage we had a beer at one of the few houses in the neighborhood (most people living in shacks) getting some rather odd looks from the passers by and a lady from the orphanage keeping a watchful eye on us to keep us out of trouble. I overheard Udo saying something about the “murder capital of the world” and said “Where’s that then?” and he said “Here.” and I sipped my beer a little faster. After that we went to a winery in Stellenbsoch that had pretty little gardens that made me feel like I was in Italy. A country of extreme contrasts is South Africa. The sunset that night was particularly beautiful so I’ve included some pictures in the next set (hover your mouse over them for any extra info blah blah blah…):

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And on Day 4 we went to Aquila Game Reserve which to be honest I was a little dissapointed by. I was hoping for a real safari type experience, with all the animals wandering free, but Aquila is a little too small for that, so (for example) they have to keep the lions penned up to stop them from eating the other animals (and each other) which makes it a slightly less than natural experience, more like a very very large zoo. However, I shouldn’t complain too much as Aquila is doing its bit for conservation and the animals look a lot healthier and happy than the poor sods locked up in Kyoto Zoo. Also I wouldn’t have been able to see such glorious beasties otherwise due to the brevity of my trip and Kruger National park being on the other side of the country. I shall, as Udo said, just have to go back. At least 21 days he said. Very precise.

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More pictures in my next post!

And he’s off!

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on August 18, 2008
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I’m off to Africa today. AFRICA!! Fancy that! Specifically, Cape Town in South Africa to visit Udo and Fumi. They live in Seapoint which I believe is a bit posh and they can it seems see whales gambolling in the ocean from their balcony. Fancy that! I told my mother about the whales and she said “What?! Wales?!” Bit of a poor sense of geography my mum.

There’s one more fresh post on Deep Kyoto before I go, this time on Les Freres Moutaux, a cafe/bakery on Aurakoji dori.

And here are a few pics from Saturday night. First the obligatory pictures of flaming Daimonji (taken from Hyakumanben) and then a couple of Mr. Masuda on the occasion of his 32nd birthday. Click on the thumbnails for a closer look.

Masuda and Koji:

Masuda:

I’ll be back in Japan on August 30th. Expect lots of pictures.

Photos from Kaga City and Environs

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on March 29, 2008
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As I mentioned previously I went to an onsen hotel in Kaga city last weekend, which I chose simply because it was cheap. This isn’t always the best criterion. “What’s in Ishikawa prefecture then?” I asked. “Mountains,” said the travel agent. “They have mountains, I think.” They do have mountains. But they are very far away. Kaga city sits in the middle of a flat plain (fringed with mountains) and is basically a bit of a dump. It consists of various box-like buildings, chain restaurants, convenience stores and featureless shopping malls and overlooking it all is a massive statue of Kannon-sama which is the essence of pure kitsch. The statue is gold in color (not real gold mind you) and has a red light on the forehead that comes on at night. I was expecting a quaint little onsen town but what I discovered was sprawling scene of urban desolation, haunted by very dodgy looking kids in tracksuits and (most excellently) sporting mullet haircuts. Well, the hotel was fine. Nice hot spring baths and good food. Just not much of a view from the veranda.

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From Kaga, you can take a tourist bus to various sites of dubious value. Natadera (那谷寺) was probably the best of the pick - a large wooded complex that takes a good couple of hours to get around. The garden there was (as Buddhist gardens tend to be) good value and worth the extra ￥200 on top of the temple entrance fee.

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Zourokuen (蔵六園) was basically a house full of old stuff, most impressive being the hina doll collection. They also had a nice garden. And then there was a bit of seaside and a walk among the pines before heading back to haunt the shopping malls of Kaga (with those kids in tracksuits I felt like I was back on Teeside) till my train arrived.

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Now I’m back in Kyoto and the cherry blossom is blooming… but no word from Kageyama about this year’s hanami party. The man has completely vanished from our lives! Here are some more pictures of a drinking party I had with my students at NEC in Osaka. It was the last class on Thursday so we went out for a few and I missed my last train and Hiroshi and Yasu were good enough to stay out with me till dawn. Needless to say I was feeling a bit rough yesterday. All’s well now though.

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Now I just have time for a couple of links. Here’s something Kumar Sivabramanian sent me on a landmark case in comics history. Kumar writes: For those who don’t know, Jerry Siegel died almost penniless, and was a mail courier for much of his later career, as I recall. Siegels Awarded Superman Rights

And here’s a very special message from a very special person to the people of Tibet. LINK

Australia: Center of the Universe

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on January 31, 2008
in Comics and Travel
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I received a very entertaining rant yesterday from a friend of mine on why he finds it difficult to get used to life in Australia:

…how do you have an intelligent conversation of any kind with someone who either thinks that A) sports is the center of the universe, B) Kylie Minogue is the center of the universe, or C) the horoscope is the center of the universe? Don’t these people realize that comics is the center of the universe! Also, anytime anyone uses a word like “brekky” instead of “breakfast” or “tradey” instead of “tradesman” I have no choice but to assume that either A) they have the mind of a 3-year old, or B) they feel the need to treat me like *I* have the mind of a 3-year-old. Either way it’s a conversation-killer as far as I’m concerned. Too bad 99% of the country does it.

Said friend will of course remain anonymous as:

…I would get beat up, I have no doubt! I forgot to mention that Australians also can’t handle any form of criticism about Australia because Australia is the greatest country in the world and they know that even if they’ve never been to another country and never would because why would they when Australia is so awesome and Australia is the center of the universe, and if you don’t believe that they will furrow up their brow in bafflement and not want to talk to you anymore, incredulous that ANYONE could ever think Australia was not the center of the universe.

Though he doesn’t seem to like Australia much, I think anonymous would like my latest posting on Rock Bar Chigaihouken over on the sister blog. And I know he’d like this free downloadable issue of Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing too.

Deep Kobe

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on July 27, 2007
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A fresh review up on Deep Kyoto today of the restaurant/gallery Neutron Cafe.

Yesterday, Kageyama-san, Betty and I went on a little day trip to Kobe. Kageyama-san is an excellent guide to Kobe as he often “escapes from Kyoto” to enjoy the more cosmopolitan atmosphere there and also - the good food. The first place he took us was a real Italian restaurant (with a real Italian pizza chef!) near Sannomiya Station called Ristorante R. Valentino. Here’s some pictures of the food:

前菜

Tuna & Olive Spaghetti

Pizza Margheritta


A set lunch consists of pizza or pasta, coffee or tea and desert. We ordered three set lunches; one pasta and two pizzas and shared. It was good value and damn tasty but the pizzas are pretty massive so we might have been better off ordering for two. After that we wandered round the Kitano-cho area to view some of the famous European residences there. This may have been a mistake as it was a super hot and muggy day and pretty soon we were wilting in the heat and ducking into air-conditioned shops at every opportunity. Kageyama-san also took us on a window-shopping tour of some the stores under the railway tracks and finally to bar Piccolo. Kageyama-san described it as the Tsurugi of Kobe and in that it is a “rock bar” it does bear some resemblance. The master here is also a sometime visitor to Tsurugi himself. However, Piccolo opens promptly at 7.30 p.m. and rapidly fills up with a young and varied crowd. It is also spacious and neat and organized. Cool place. Nice beers. Here are some more pictures, just hover your cursor over them for extra information or double click for a closer look:

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Kinosaki and Genbudo

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on April 3, 2007
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Ok, as promised here are the pictures from the second day of our trip to Kinosaki onsen resort. We also took a short trip to the seaside and (from Kinosaki but a short taxi-ride away) went to Genbudo. Genbudo has some very interesting volcanic rock formations and a museum with a very cool rock collection and extremely cool fossils. Anyway, here are some clickable pictures for you to peruse.

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And this is Hyon Ju’s artistic impression of what happened when we got to the station and realised our train was not at 4.18 but at 4.13 and had just left:
A very nice likeness, I think.

April First Anniversary

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on April 1, 2007
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This blog is one year old today. Goodness gracious me. Now as I mentioned a few days ago, I went to Kinosaki onsen resort last week with Hyon Ju, so I’ll post some pictures from Tuesday here. We did a lot of hot-spring bathing, clip-clopping about the streets in geta and eating eating eating… And then we had one of those (amicable) conversations that couples have sometimes, that finish with them not being couples anymore. So we decided to be friends and I’m single again (cue the Austin Powers music), which I think is for the best really, although it’s rather sad, after a year of being in each others pockets… and then of course two days later HJ got the news that her visa application was rejected again. So she’s going back to Korea for good next week on Monday. So what with all THAT going on I haven’t been posting much. Do forgive me.

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I’ll post Wednesday’s photos tomorrow.

I just realised you may not be able to see the photo’s after all due to blogger’s usual inadequacies (seriously thinking of moving folks!) so just click here instead: http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/144105/overview

Pictures From Korea

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on September 3, 2006
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This is the master of Yangyang pension and his wife. Lovely couple. We dined with them on our last night in Yangyang. It was one of the highlights of our trip.
Above is the pension we stayed at for three nights in Yangyang. Really nice place.
Find out more here: www.yangyangpension.com

We did a lot of hiking and saw some fantastic fairytale views…
And we ate a lot!
These pictures are just a taster. All in all I took eight rolls of film in one week in Korea. I’ve managed to edit it down to just over 40 pictures which you can see here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/46253270@N00/sets/72157594164482825/

I’ve written an explanation with each picture and it took me some time to upload them all and to write all that so it’d be really nice if some of you would take a look. Nice pictures! Just click on the link above.

Tomorrow is my first day back at school. Yuck. Well, I’m prepared anyway.

Back from Korea

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on August 31, 2006
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I just got back from Korea today and I’m well-tired. Glad to be back but I did have a great time there; lots of good food, country walks, friendly people etc… I’ll be writing more about the trip and posting lots of pics once I get them developed. In the meantime here’s a teaser from the few pictures I took with my mobile. The picture below is of our first Korean draft beers on arriving in Seoul. In Korea beer is “mekchu” and “Cheers” or “Kampai” is “Kombe!” Sadly, Korean draft beer is generally speaking thin, watery and barely deserving of the name.
So we switched to Heinken.
These bollards are everywhere in Seoul. Koreans don’t like paying parking fees, so they’ll park anywhere else they can which presents a problem for pedestrians. These bollards are there to stop them.
In this season you can see this everywhere you go: chilli peppers laid out to dry in the summer sun. That’s what makes the kimchee so hot hot hot!
We spent a lot of time on buses. A long time on buses can do things to people’s minds.

Once I get those pictures developed I’ll post some pictures of the fantastically beautiful Korean scenery. (Oh! Those mountains!) And of the very nice people we met there. Watch this space…