Days 8 & 9: Nagoya, Tokyo, Shibuya

Resting masterfully at the intersection of sport, ritual, and mass, sumo wrestling is entertainment at its finest. 

Two featherweights prepare to duel

Tournaments last 14 days with rookies squaring off in the mornings and the vets going later in the day. 

The Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium  was relatively empty when we arrived for the low-rank matches at 11am. We moved from our back row seats up to a set of four floor cushions that constituted ring-side box seats. From there we had quite the view of the wrestlers squashing into each other. It was awesome. We only half understood what was going on but between the cushion seating, noodles from the concession stand, and gnarly takedowns, it was an afternoon that couldn't be beat. 

Some big boys 

Afterwards we checked into our hostel in Tokyo, a run-down white building in the middle of nowhere. Inside the smelly entrance, an ugly smattering of men was making grunting noises and Dickie was headed to the couch to pass out. Tau Epsilon Phi, it appeared, was solvent and thriving. 

The beds made no sense. They were large cupboards that held a single mattress. 

Dick was wary of the fact that the lock was on the outside. We were sitting ducks for any deranged backpacker who wanted to lock us in our capsules. For safety's sake, we ran a couple of lock-in simulations before going to bed, but Dick was never able to escape. 

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Anyways, that's about it from Japan, folks. Tomorrow we'll so a little shopping in the Shibuya district before shipping back home to New York. Thanks to everyone for following along -- we'll try to do better next time!

 People are sometimes used as horses in Japan. Neat!

Day 7: Takayama

Long, tiring day so I'll be brief. 

Took an hour-long bus to Kamikochi today to go hiking. We were loading up on snacks at the bus stop when I saw a familiar sight. 

Milk from TEP

As we hiked along rivers and ponds high up in the mountains, we had lots of time to clear our minds. Towards the end of the hike we stopped at a small wooden tea stand. "I feel so zen right now, I wish I was a tree" remarked Dick over a cup of green tea. Another great day in the books. 

Great views, better company :)

TIPS AND OBSERVATIONS FROM DAY 7:

- There are no public trash cans on the streets anywhere. If you have a piece of garbage, you're stuck with it for the rest of the day.

- Found some look-alikes:

 Japanese Brett

 Japanese Green

Japanese Segal

5 Japanese Dickies

Day 6: Nagoya

We were walking through a park on the way to a sumo tournament when we heard hip hop blasting from behind some trees. The music led us to a group of kids who were trick slack-lining, which is when you bounce and do flips on an inch-wide rope tied between two trees. 

A small crowd had set up chairs/tents and was barbecuing on the sidelines. Between the music and the cheering crowd, the atmosphere was awesome. There was one grandmaster teaching the others how to do advanced stunts. He was sweating a lot, like Beispel on the bus to DMB except less tears. 

After watching for a bit we were invited to jump in. Dick was more of a liability than anything else. 

By the time we had our fun slackin' the string and made our way to the sumo gym, tickets for the day had sold out. We bought tickets for Tuesday instead and were on our way out when we met a sumo preparing for his next match.

Japanese Mike Green

Our next destination was Takayama, a small city located in the Japanese Alps. The receptionist at our hostel was very excited to tell us she had American treats in the communal snack bowl on her desk. We politely declined her offer with an "ugh!" when we saw that her idea of an American snack was half a Fruit by the Foot in a bowl of onion chips. 

An American classic

"I thought Americans loved this snack!" she exclaimed, surprised. 

After we checked in we settled in and enjoyed a little down time for the first time in our trip and went to bed early. Tomorrow we'd be hiking the Alps. 

TIPS AND OBSERVATIONS FROM DAY 6:

- 7/11 is on every corner, in every mall, at every train station, everywhere. It even has its brand of own ATM's in the local banks.

- Best Purchase: 88 cent half-gallon waters from 7/11. 

- Worst item brought from home: Pants. Heavy in the backpack, hot on the legs. We carry everything with us in one backpac each, so every pound counts and pants have no business in Japan.

- Biggest dupe: Cat toy at the morning market for ¥300. 

Nope, that's just some sticks you found on the ground.

Day 5: Hiroshima and Kyoto

Dick was a bit nervous when we stepped off the train at the Hiroshima station. Between the possibility of lingering radiation and/or lingering bad blood from WWII, Dick stressed that today was NOT a day you wanted to be caught sleeping. 

Not today

We headed for the WWII Peace Musuem and surrounding monuments for a look back to August 6, 1945. Not much to say other than the historic documents and graphic images make a strong case for peace.

A watch stopped at 8:15am -- the exact moment the atomic bomb exploded. 

The trees in the surrounding park did not ease Dickie's fear of radiation. In addition to growing branches, leaves, and other normal tree things, they were also sprouting grass. 

Yikes!

When we had seen all the sights in Hiroshima, we came back to Kyoto to our first Japanese-style hostel. It was a 100 year-old wooden house with small rooms.  Guests here are provided with some weird stuff: a tea set, the world's smallest toothpaste, pillows stuffed with beans instead of down/cotton, and a floor pad to sleep on. 

Toothbrush and toothpaste for Japanese ants

The only truly odd part of the hostel was that there were no toilets, only footbaths where one would expect the toilet to be. At first, the footbaths were too cold for us to keep our feet in for more than 3 or 4 minutes. But by the end of our stay Dickie was able to submerge for 15 minutes, easy.  

Frigid foot bath

Anyways, after a bit of rest we got into the vodka that Dickie had been hauling around since we picked it up at Duty Free in Canada. We got good and liquored up and headed out for the  clubs the hostel recommended. 

Kyoto at night looks nearly the same as it does during the day, except the night is lit by flashing neon signs and the streets are absolutely SOAKED in puke. 

We arrived downtown to a complete zoo -- kids booting in the middle of sidewalk, rolling their unconscious friends through the streets, and passing out in parking lots. Those who were still conscious passed the time by pulling trig into the river. I checked my watch -- it was 11pm. Needless to say, Japan is home to some of the sweetest bros on earth. 

Oddest part of all of this was that, as much of a madhouse the streets were, the bars were super tame. All of the places we went to held about 30 people max, and consisted of small groups sitting around tables with music softly playing in the background. How and why did these kids get so wasted, we wondered. 

Eventually we found a bar that was a bit more what we were used to. We spent the night there before going home, taking a nice long footbath, and called it a night. 

TIPS AND OBSERVATIONS FROM DAY 5:

- Jaywalking is completely non-existant here. Even on narrow backroads void of any traffic, nobody budges until the light shows the blinking green man. Dick thinks this is how pedestrians display their respect for drivers -- I don't know what to think. It's a huge inconvenience. 

- Whenever anybody walks into a store/restaurant, all of the workers scream Japanese greetings at you. It's startling and we have no idea what they're yelling at us. Not wanting to be disrespectful we just shout back.