While Beijing is like seeing the future rushing towards you, being in Hong Kong is like you're already in the future. We just had love at first sight here, from the ease at which one gets from the airport to the city center on the super-fast, super-clean, super-modern train system, to the amazing flurry of activity and humanity around you all the time. And to top it all off, HK is surrounded by gorgeous lush green hills and water.
Our first activity in HK was to go to the fish, bird, and flower markets.
Friday, August 29, 2008
Mmmm, Crunchy!
On our last night in Beijing, we finally made it to the night market downtown, where one can find the craziest foods imaginable, all skewered and ready to be boiled in oil. There's crickets, snake, starfish, and even dog. I chose a mixed bag of chicken hearts, lamb kidneys, big fat bugs, and scorpions. While that ordering may seem to reflect the strangeness of the food, it actually ranks the food from worst to best for me.
The scorpion was absolutely delicious: crunchy, salty, and even a little sweet. For those of you who love fried shrimp heads, such as at Japanese restaurants, it was much like that.
Last Day in Beijing
On our last day in Beijing, we woke up early and headed over to the Summer Palace, the Emperors' summer residence, which is just outside the city center, but 10 degrees cooler, and much prettier, in our estimation, than the Forbidden City. It's essentially a small lake (several miles around) with numerous islands connected by beautiful stone bridges, and a temple complex set on a hill overlooking it all.
Part of what made the Summer Palace so much better for us was that we had a chance to hang out with all the Chinese enjoying the park first thing in the morning. In fact, we were able to join in with some of their activities, specifically, ribbon-twirling, hacky-sacking, kite-flying, and group dance aerobics. They were all so friendly and happy to have us join in that it was a blast.
After the Summer Palace, we hopped a cab over to another "must see," the Lama Temple. This is the biggest and best Bhuddist temple in Beijing. It was actually several temples in one complex, with increasingly large Bhuddas in each of the separate buildings. The largest of these is over 80 feet tall, and apparently made out of a single tree! It's so tall that you can barely see the head when you crane your neck to peer up four stories.
After the Lama Temple, we went back to Tianenmen Square to really do it this time instead of a walk-by. Unfortunately, we arrived after the Mao Zedong Museum had closed for the day at noon, so we contented ourselves by strolling around the immense public square (largest in the world) and then having tea at a tea-house overlooking Tianenmen.
Then, in our search for the Beijing Underground Museum, which is apparently a bunch of tunnels built during the Soviet era, we ended up wandering around the Hutong for a couple hours (apparently the museum is no longer there). We made at least two friends, one of whom liked Jessica, and tried to get her to come home with him, and the other of whom took a liking to me and walked with us all the way back to Tianenmen, commenting incessantly about how tall I am.
Part of what made the Summer Palace so much better for us was that we had a chance to hang out with all the Chinese enjoying the park first thing in the morning. In fact, we were able to join in with some of their activities, specifically, ribbon-twirling, hacky-sacking, kite-flying, and group dance aerobics. They were all so friendly and happy to have us join in that it was a blast.
After the Summer Palace, we hopped a cab over to another "must see," the Lama Temple. This is the biggest and best Bhuddist temple in Beijing. It was actually several temples in one complex, with increasingly large Bhuddas in each of the separate buildings. The largest of these is over 80 feet tall, and apparently made out of a single tree! It's so tall that you can barely see the head when you crane your neck to peer up four stories.
After the Lama Temple, we went back to Tianenmen Square to really do it this time instead of a walk-by. Unfortunately, we arrived after the Mao Zedong Museum had closed for the day at noon, so we contented ourselves by strolling around the immense public square (largest in the world) and then having tea at a tea-house overlooking Tianenmen.
Then, in our search for the Beijing Underground Museum, which is apparently a bunch of tunnels built during the Soviet era, we ended up wandering around the Hutong for a couple hours (apparently the museum is no longer there). We made at least two friends, one of whom liked Jessica, and tried to get her to come home with him, and the other of whom took a liking to me and walked with us all the way back to Tianenmen, commenting incessantly about how tall I am.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Tailors, Art, and Chinese lessons
We spent this morning at a tailor, where we worked with the lovely Holly, a very skillful veteran of the trade. We picked out fabrics and designed a number of suits based on magazine pictures. She asked us to come back tomorrow night for a final adjustment, and that's it! Not only does the dollar go far when you're getting tailoring done in Beijing, but we think we got "special price for you:" $150 for a full suit and $12 for a dress shirt.
After lunch, we headed over to an amazing enclave of artists tucked away into old factories, some of which are still working. Apparently, the artists moved into these industrial spaces in the late '90's in secret, in order to showcase their work. It was since discovered, but because the eyes of the world have been on Beijing since they won the bid for the Olympics, the authorities have so far allowed the artists to remain where they are. Unfortunately, the most moving installations that clearly reflect government suppression are accompanied by write-ups that seem obviously government-censured in their blandness. However, all in all, it was a fantastic experience not only to get a sense of art in China, but also to walk through these amazing converted spaces, which were often just as interesting as the art itself.
After winding our way through dozens of galleries tucked into former factories small and large, we sat in a pleasant open courtyard for a beer, blended fruit drink, and banana cake. It started with one translation request, and quickly became an in-depth lesson in Mandarin that lasted for almost an hour, with the full attention of both waitresses and the surrounding patrons, giggling all the time. Our pitiful attempts at pronunciation were clearly hilarious, and in trying to practice with our ad-hoc teachers, we often found ourselves saying something completely other than what we had intended, as indicated by laughs from the peanut gallery and utter confusion on the part of our instructors.
Tomorrow is our last full day in Beijing and we have a packed schedule, starting with 6:30 Tai Chi in the Summer Palace, the Emperor's former summer residence, where despite being just a few kilometers out of town, it is 10 degrees cooler than the Forbidden City.
After lunch, we headed over to an amazing enclave of artists tucked away into old factories, some of which are still working. Apparently, the artists moved into these industrial spaces in the late '90's in secret, in order to showcase their work. It was since discovered, but because the eyes of the world have been on Beijing since they won the bid for the Olympics, the authorities have so far allowed the artists to remain where they are. Unfortunately, the most moving installations that clearly reflect government suppression are accompanied by write-ups that seem obviously government-censured in their blandness. However, all in all, it was a fantastic experience not only to get a sense of art in China, but also to walk through these amazing converted spaces, which were often just as interesting as the art itself.
After winding our way through dozens of galleries tucked into former factories small and large, we sat in a pleasant open courtyard for a beer, blended fruit drink, and banana cake. It started with one translation request, and quickly became an in-depth lesson in Mandarin that lasted for almost an hour, with the full attention of both waitresses and the surrounding patrons, giggling all the time. Our pitiful attempts at pronunciation were clearly hilarious, and in trying to practice with our ad-hoc teachers, we often found ourselves saying something completely other than what we had intended, as indicated by laughs from the peanut gallery and utter confusion on the part of our instructors.
Tomorrow is our last full day in Beijing and we have a packed schedule, starting with 6:30 Tai Chi in the Summer Palace, the Emperor's former summer residence, where despite being just a few kilometers out of town, it is 10 degrees cooler than the Forbidden City.
Butts, Bellies, & Backpacks
A few interesting little observations:
1) Diapers don't appear to exist in Beijing. If a baby is wearing pants at all, they're wearing chaps--with nothing underneath. This isn't an homage to Western style, babies are just potty-trained from such an early age that they skip the whole diaper thing. According to our friend who lives here and has two babies, the missing material allows a baby and his/her parents to focus on their bits constantly, so they can learn to control their bathroom maneuvers. I wonder what Freud would have to say about that. The downside is that the children tend to pop a squat wherever they feel like it, which can be right in front of you on the sidewalk.
2) Chinese men have a funny habit of pulling their shirts up, exposing their bellies, when it heats up outside. Just sort of funny seeing little pot-bellies poking out everywhere in the middle of the city.
3) Jessica and I have gotten a couple of flattering comments from other travellers we've run into to the effect that we are the lightest packers they've ever seen. Interestingly, each of us thinks we would feel comfortable with even less, especially if we hadn't climbed Mt. Fuji, which had such low temperatures, requiring us to pack winter gear. Our quick-dry gear is so great that we can see how one outfit would be sufficient. In fact, Jessica only has one pair of pants/shorts.
1) Diapers don't appear to exist in Beijing. If a baby is wearing pants at all, they're wearing chaps--with nothing underneath. This isn't an homage to Western style, babies are just potty-trained from such an early age that they skip the whole diaper thing. According to our friend who lives here and has two babies, the missing material allows a baby and his/her parents to focus on their bits constantly, so they can learn to control their bathroom maneuvers. I wonder what Freud would have to say about that. The downside is that the children tend to pop a squat wherever they feel like it, which can be right in front of you on the sidewalk.
2) Chinese men have a funny habit of pulling their shirts up, exposing their bellies, when it heats up outside. Just sort of funny seeing little pot-bellies poking out everywhere in the middle of the city.
3) Jessica and I have gotten a couple of flattering comments from other travellers we've run into to the effect that we are the lightest packers they've ever seen. Interestingly, each of us thinks we would feel comfortable with even less, especially if we hadn't climbed Mt. Fuji, which had such low temperatures, requiring us to pack winter gear. Our quick-dry gear is so great that we can see how one outfit would be sufficient. In fact, Jessica only has one pair of pants/shorts.
Great Wall
Eschewing a more expensive tour group, on the advice of some nice Dutchmen, we hired a cab to take us to a less touristy part of the the Great Wall for about $80. Although more than two hours out of town, Simatai was certainly as dramatic as the guidebooks said, and well worth it. We opted to hike up to the Wall instead of taking the gondola. The Wall itself is a challenge to walk, with an incline of 70 degrees in some areas, high narrow steps, and uneven footing. However, it was no match for our Tevas.
It was both a physical and emotional journey, knowing that the Wall was built by thousands if not millions of prisoners of war. The ridge line on which the Wall was built is so steep that our progress was slow, let alone the workers who brought those millions of bricks up there.
After runs up several long flights of steps and a knee-pounding descent, we were happy to ride the gondola back down. To our surprise, our cab driver had stuck around for about 3.5 hours to take us back to Beijing, per our agreement (he probably just couldn't find another fare). When we finally got back to the city, however, he didn't want to honor the deal we'd made at the outset, and tried to charge us the metered fare, which was about twice as much. Needless to say, there was a lot of talking past each other, to put it politely. I found the word for "50" in my guidebook and repeated it to him again and again in an attempt to get my change, to no avail, so we just got out and ate the $7. Interesting note: while $7 isn't worth fighting a cabbie to me, that's almost a decent daily living wage, so our driver did pretty well for himself.
Emerging from one of the convenient public bathrooms on the main drag near our hostel, I was happily surprised to see the familiar red, white, and blue spiraling sign of a barbershop. In a word, that was the best $1.50 haircut I've ever gotten.
It was both a physical and emotional journey, knowing that the Wall was built by thousands if not millions of prisoners of war. The ridge line on which the Wall was built is so steep that our progress was slow, let alone the workers who brought those millions of bricks up there.
After runs up several long flights of steps and a knee-pounding descent, we were happy to ride the gondola back down. To our surprise, our cab driver had stuck around for about 3.5 hours to take us back to Beijing, per our agreement (he probably just couldn't find another fare). When we finally got back to the city, however, he didn't want to honor the deal we'd made at the outset, and tried to charge us the metered fare, which was about twice as much. Needless to say, there was a lot of talking past each other, to put it politely. I found the word for "50" in my guidebook and repeated it to him again and again in an attempt to get my change, to no avail, so we just got out and ate the $7. Interesting note: while $7 isn't worth fighting a cabbie to me, that's almost a decent daily living wage, so our driver did pretty well for himself.
Emerging from one of the convenient public bathrooms on the main drag near our hostel, I was happily surprised to see the familiar red, white, and blue spiraling sign of a barbershop. In a word, that was the best $1.50 haircut I've ever gotten.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Forbidden Olympics
On our second day of trying to get into the Olympics, we decided to go straight for the motherload--the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube in the middle of the Olympic village, where most of the events were going on on the last day. We walked around amid throngs of Chinese waiting to go to their events, quietly saying "tickets?" to everyone, and getting mainly quizzical looks and curious smiles in return. We finally ran into a guy asking $900 for a pair of tickets to handball, which was on the other side of the city, but started in just a few minutes. As neither Jessica nor I could really identify what the sport of handball is, we decided to pass on that proposition. We settled instead for a few pictures of the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube from across the freeway that separated the coveted ticket-holders from the envious.
After getting our fill walking around in the sweltering heat outside the Olympic Village, we decided to head to the next hot spot on our list--the Forbidden City. We took the madly crowded subway to the center of town and began exploring this enormous city within a city. After walking around the outer ring of the Forbidden City, we stopped for lunch at a noodle place right through a security checkpoint of some kind. Upon our return to the area we had come from before lunch, the same security guard that we had gesticulated at about the restaurant attempted to charge us $15 each to pass back through the gate. We of course refused and attempted to indicate that we had just been there. After several back and forths, she became frustrated that she wasn't going to win that one, grabbed our tickets, and ripped them to shreds. Shrugging our shoulders, we chalked that one up to the whole "saving face" thing and continued on our way.
We next bought tickets to the actual inner core of the Forbidden City, where we had cool GPS-enabled audio tour guides that spoke to us in a soothing Chinese-inflected British English about extremely detailed ceremonies that happened in the distant past in each of the various temples within the Forbidden City. Neither of us could keep up with all of the detail, so we would continue walking on, effectively cutting our nice tour guide off mid-sentence again and again.
At one point we came upon a very athletic Jamaican-appearing fellow surrounded by a shrieking throng of Chinese teens taking his picture as he calmly typed into his blackberry. I snapped a quick picture thinking he might be Usain Bolt, Asafa Powell, or another of the famous Jamaicans (a later comparison of his picture to those in the newspaper proved that he was neither Bolt nor Powell). All of a sudden a Chinese teen spotted us and asked to take a picture. Now we were the center of attention. Apparently they thought we were athletes and asked to pose with us. We happily obliged.
After walking around the *enormous* Forbidden City, we hopped a cab over to a massage place to work out the kinks. Cabs are great because the original Hutong, or warren of alleyways, that Beijing is made up of, is overlaid with wide streets at approximately half mile intervals. In other words, it's not a walking city. And cabs are usually about $2. Our massages were a guilt-free $20 each, and involved soaking our tired doggies in a wooden barrel full of hot slimy water. After an hour of relaxation, we decided to retire early.
Lost in translation:
1 pair of sunglasses--fell into public hole in the ground (toilet)
The USB drive at our internet cafe doesn't work, so we'll be posting pictures when we get to Hong Kong.
After getting our fill walking around in the sweltering heat outside the Olympic Village, we decided to head to the next hot spot on our list--the Forbidden City. We took the madly crowded subway to the center of town and began exploring this enormous city within a city. After walking around the outer ring of the Forbidden City, we stopped for lunch at a noodle place right through a security checkpoint of some kind. Upon our return to the area we had come from before lunch, the same security guard that we had gesticulated at about the restaurant attempted to charge us $15 each to pass back through the gate. We of course refused and attempted to indicate that we had just been there. After several back and forths, she became frustrated that she wasn't going to win that one, grabbed our tickets, and ripped them to shreds. Shrugging our shoulders, we chalked that one up to the whole "saving face" thing and continued on our way.
We next bought tickets to the actual inner core of the Forbidden City, where we had cool GPS-enabled audio tour guides that spoke to us in a soothing Chinese-inflected British English about extremely detailed ceremonies that happened in the distant past in each of the various temples within the Forbidden City. Neither of us could keep up with all of the detail, so we would continue walking on, effectively cutting our nice tour guide off mid-sentence again and again.
At one point we came upon a very athletic Jamaican-appearing fellow surrounded by a shrieking throng of Chinese teens taking his picture as he calmly typed into his blackberry. I snapped a quick picture thinking he might be Usain Bolt, Asafa Powell, or another of the famous Jamaicans (a later comparison of his picture to those in the newspaper proved that he was neither Bolt nor Powell). All of a sudden a Chinese teen spotted us and asked to take a picture. Now we were the center of attention. Apparently they thought we were athletes and asked to pose with us. We happily obliged.
After walking around the *enormous* Forbidden City, we hopped a cab over to a massage place to work out the kinks. Cabs are great because the original Hutong, or warren of alleyways, that Beijing is made up of, is overlaid with wide streets at approximately half mile intervals. In other words, it's not a walking city. And cabs are usually about $2. Our massages were a guilt-free $20 each, and involved soaking our tired doggies in a wooden barrel full of hot slimy water. After an hour of relaxation, we decided to retire early.
Lost in translation:
1 pair of sunglasses--fell into public hole in the ground (toilet)
The USB drive at our internet cafe doesn't work, so we'll be posting pictures when we get to Hong Kong.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Beijing Dock (Peking Duck)
In a few words, Beijing is big, shiny, and new. Add the word "very" before each of those descriptors, and you're a little closer to capturing the essence of this immense megalopolis and its palpable energy. I'm sure you're sick of hearing things like "China is exploding right now," and "you can see the future in Beijing," but the fact is, it's true. I live in New York, and Beijing is just plain impressive. The buildings are big, modern, and all brand new.
The airport here is the biggest thing I've ever seen. It goes on for miles, and half of it isn't even open yet. The roads, subway, and other infrastructure are all brand new. And the best part is that everything costs about a buck fiddy. Walking into a mall here is unlike anything I've ever seen anywhere...bright and shiny, it *looks* like capitalism. The funny part is, however, that you walk into a big electronics store, and it's still just 5 stories of lots of individual vendors hawking their wares. No price tags, it's still just good old-fashioned bargaining here.
We even had an encounter with our first con-artist of the trip today. He claimed to be an "English language volunteer" for the store, but he took us through the first four stories of the electronics department store-bazaar to an eery fifth floor twilight zone, where he sat us down at a little table while the guy who ostensibly worked there went to retrieve batteries for our cameras. At that point, our little friend mentioned that he had a buddy who was really into foreign currency and would be really interested in exchanging "just a little bit" with us. Jessica promptly cut off the conversation and dragged my naive self out of there before I could inquire further as to his friend's particular interests. Thank God at least one of us is a born cynic.
Faux pas of the day: asking for rice with Jessica's Kung Pau chicken. Whoops.
Lost in translation:
3 socks
1 pair of pants
1 pair of hiking boots
1 pair of sunglasses
2 camera batteries
After replacing our camera batteries, we were off up the street to try to get into the Games. We had chosen the table tennis venue (events are spread out all over the city), and hoped for the best. When we got there, we found that the ticket office was closed, unsurprisingly, so we asked a volunteer Olympics worker where we might find tickets, hoping she might have some insight. She suggested buying tickets "from one of the men on the bridge," which turned out to mean scalpers standing on a pedestrian bridge directly behind us. Apparently scalping is an expected practice.
In short, a ticket with face value of $20 was going for $400, so we passed on table tennis.
The airport here is the biggest thing I've ever seen. It goes on for miles, and half of it isn't even open yet. The roads, subway, and other infrastructure are all brand new. And the best part is that everything costs about a buck fiddy. Walking into a mall here is unlike anything I've ever seen anywhere...bright and shiny, it *looks* like capitalism. The funny part is, however, that you walk into a big electronics store, and it's still just 5 stories of lots of individual vendors hawking their wares. No price tags, it's still just good old-fashioned bargaining here.
We even had an encounter with our first con-artist of the trip today. He claimed to be an "English language volunteer" for the store, but he took us through the first four stories of the electronics department store-bazaar to an eery fifth floor twilight zone, where he sat us down at a little table while the guy who ostensibly worked there went to retrieve batteries for our cameras. At that point, our little friend mentioned that he had a buddy who was really into foreign currency and would be really interested in exchanging "just a little bit" with us. Jessica promptly cut off the conversation and dragged my naive self out of there before I could inquire further as to his friend's particular interests. Thank God at least one of us is a born cynic.
Faux pas of the day: asking for rice with Jessica's Kung Pau chicken. Whoops.
Lost in translation:
3 socks
1 pair of pants
1 pair of hiking boots
1 pair of sunglasses
2 camera batteries
After replacing our camera batteries, we were off up the street to try to get into the Games. We had chosen the table tennis venue (events are spread out all over the city), and hoped for the best. When we got there, we found that the ticket office was closed, unsurprisingly, so we asked a volunteer Olympics worker where we might find tickets, hoping she might have some insight. She suggested buying tickets "from one of the men on the bridge," which turned out to mean scalpers standing on a pedestrian bridge directly behind us. Apparently scalping is an expected practice.
In short, a ticket with face value of $20 was going for $400, so we passed on table tennis.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Fuji-san
So, after starting out our day with a little sushi at 6:30 (we woke up at 4:30) and having a quick mid-morning nap, we headed out of Shinjuku station on a Highway Express Bus bound for Yamanaguchi (aka "Gateway Fujiyama").
From there we hopped a local bus to drive about halfway up Fuji-san, where we began our climb at the 5th Station at about 4 in the afternoon.
The going seemed a little too easy initially, as the path was headed downhill, but the hoards of haggard hikers shuffling towards us indicated that we were on the right track (no pun intended).
Our goal was to hike about 4 hours, to Station 8, where we had a reservation at the Fujisan Hotel ("hotel" is being used loosely in this case). However, the rain gods had other plans in store for us.
Not just rain, but hail--pea-sized hail, and buckets of it, as evidenced by Jessica's extensive bruising (pictures of her pock-marked bruising forthcoming). Our hail-hike took a little over an hour, and the abuse only came to an end when friendly Aki offered us a bed in his mountain hut at the 7th Station at about 6 pm.
After a quick, delicious meal of Japanese curry and rice, we hit the sack for a few hours, our drenched gear hanging over the little fireplace to dry while the other hikers sat around and cured our longjohns with cigarette smoke.
About 5 (sleepless for Jessica, restful for me) hours later, we woke up to tackle the rest of the hike, hoping to make it to the summit by sunrise at 4:15 am. We almost made it. However, our plan had been derailed by our little hail misadventure, and it was not to be. Despite doggedly dragging ourselves up the mountain for 3 hours, we were almost an hour short of making to the top for the first rays of light peaking over the horizon. No matter, it was beautiful from 100 meters below.
Thanks to Aki, despite running out of money after paying for our night's accommodations, we had Bento box "lunches" (at 5 in the morning) of some canned mystery meat and rice to eat on the summit, which had a tiny village of sorts catering to the exhausted hikers who made it that far. I was warned of this "bazaar" on the summit, but I actually found it rather charming in a weird Japanese way. Of course there is a store on the top of the tallest mountain in Japan. It's Japan.
If my sore legs and the faces of those around me were any indication, Fuji is a bigger undertaking than most realize when they start up it. In short, it's no joke. I felt like someone climbing Everest, taking one baby step every couple seconds. But at least I was experiencing some sort of hiker's high for much of the climb. Jessica didn't fare as well. She was unable to speak at one point, but she pushed through to the finish in impressive fashion. I think she's still recovering. She's currently passed out so hard that she didn't hear me knocking on the door of our room and I had to get the lady from the front desk let me back in.
Last night we both crashed in our hostel in Tokyo. Without thinking too clearly about what we were doing, we put all of our clothes in the washing machine and then promptly decided it was a good time to go to dinner...I ended up wearing my long underwear bottoms and my raincoat, and Jessica wore a tank top and a skirt made of a sheet wrapped around her waist.
The batteries in both of our cameras broke within a few hours of each other, so all my pics of Fuji are on the iPhone. You'll just have to wait.
From there we hopped a local bus to drive about halfway up Fuji-san, where we began our climb at the 5th Station at about 4 in the afternoon.
The going seemed a little too easy initially, as the path was headed downhill, but the hoards of haggard hikers shuffling towards us indicated that we were on the right track (no pun intended).
Our goal was to hike about 4 hours, to Station 8, where we had a reservation at the Fujisan Hotel ("hotel" is being used loosely in this case). However, the rain gods had other plans in store for us.
Not just rain, but hail--pea-sized hail, and buckets of it, as evidenced by Jessica's extensive bruising (pictures of her pock-marked bruising forthcoming). Our hail-hike took a little over an hour, and the abuse only came to an end when friendly Aki offered us a bed in his mountain hut at the 7th Station at about 6 pm.
After a quick, delicious meal of Japanese curry and rice, we hit the sack for a few hours, our drenched gear hanging over the little fireplace to dry while the other hikers sat around and cured our longjohns with cigarette smoke.
About 5 (sleepless for Jessica, restful for me) hours later, we woke up to tackle the rest of the hike, hoping to make it to the summit by sunrise at 4:15 am. We almost made it. However, our plan had been derailed by our little hail misadventure, and it was not to be. Despite doggedly dragging ourselves up the mountain for 3 hours, we were almost an hour short of making to the top for the first rays of light peaking over the horizon. No matter, it was beautiful from 100 meters below.
Thanks to Aki, despite running out of money after paying for our night's accommodations, we had Bento box "lunches" (at 5 in the morning) of some canned mystery meat and rice to eat on the summit, which had a tiny village of sorts catering to the exhausted hikers who made it that far. I was warned of this "bazaar" on the summit, but I actually found it rather charming in a weird Japanese way. Of course there is a store on the top of the tallest mountain in Japan. It's Japan.
If my sore legs and the faces of those around me were any indication, Fuji is a bigger undertaking than most realize when they start up it. In short, it's no joke. I felt like someone climbing Everest, taking one baby step every couple seconds. But at least I was experiencing some sort of hiker's high for much of the climb. Jessica didn't fare as well. She was unable to speak at one point, but she pushed through to the finish in impressive fashion. I think she's still recovering. She's currently passed out so hard that she didn't hear me knocking on the door of our room and I had to get the lady from the front desk let me back in.
Last night we both crashed in our hostel in Tokyo. Without thinking too clearly about what we were doing, we put all of our clothes in the washing machine and then promptly decided it was a good time to go to dinner...I ended up wearing my long underwear bottoms and my raincoat, and Jessica wore a tank top and a skirt made of a sheet wrapped around her waist.
The batteries in both of our cameras broke within a few hours of each other, so all my pics of Fuji are on the iPhone. You'll just have to wait.
Tsukiji Fish Market
Tsukiji is the biggest fish market in the world, and unlike some superlatives, there is no doubt in the visitor's mind that this is the case.
It is several football fields large, and filled with hundreds of little stalls hawking every weird undersea creature you've never seen before.
But before you even enter the huge hanger-style enclosure, there is an amazing intersection that is strangely reminiscent of Star Korndor or whatever one of those far-flung Star Wars planets is called, with all of these funny three-wheeled carts zipping around, which have the engine and front wheel housed in the same cylindrical compartment. Somehow these guys driving their carts loaded with fish manage not to hit each other--or any tourists--and eat ice cream cones or smoke cigarettes at the same time.
Tsukiji being Tsukiji, the best sushi in the world can be had right around the corner at 6:30 in the morning. But we just got off the plane, so who cares what time it is!
Monday, August 18, 2008
Lift Off...
We are sitting here in our apartment in New York City at 1 in the morning, half-watching the 3-meter Olympic diving competition and quivering with excitement. In 7 hours, we'll be in a cab on the way to the airport, and 3 hours after that, we'll be on our way to Tokyo on the big metal bird! We can't wait!
We're making some last-minute preparations, such as reserving the overnight trains that will take us between Moscow and St. Pete's and will function as transport, accommodation, and a great chance to experience some real old-time Russian body odor, as we'll be sharing our cabin with another couple of people (it's 2nd class--that's how we roll).
Using my Spanish-language international calling card to make reservations on the other side of the globe is always interesting. The worst part isn't not speaking the language when someone picks up, it's typing in 46 numbers every time you call, just to find out that the line's busy. Makes you appreciate speed dial. On my iPhone, it's really dumbed down. I can practically scroll through pictures of my friends and family and then just press the picture, like a chimp pressing the screen to get a piece of banana.
Time to upload the first pictures of our trip. These are from Maine, where we reacquainted ourselves with our American roots before setting off for the land of the rising sun.
We're making some last-minute preparations, such as reserving the overnight trains that will take us between Moscow and St. Pete's and will function as transport, accommodation, and a great chance to experience some real old-time Russian body odor, as we'll be sharing our cabin with another couple of people (it's 2nd class--that's how we roll).
Using my Spanish-language international calling card to make reservations on the other side of the globe is always interesting. The worst part isn't not speaking the language when someone picks up, it's typing in 46 numbers every time you call, just to find out that the line's busy. Makes you appreciate speed dial. On my iPhone, it's really dumbed down. I can practically scroll through pictures of my friends and family and then just press the picture, like a chimp pressing the screen to get a piece of banana.
Time to upload the first pictures of our trip. These are from Maine, where we reacquainted ourselves with our American roots before setting off for the land of the rising sun.
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