Naoshima - Art Island

There are many small islands off the coast of Takamatsu, which you can travel to by ferry quite easily. Alternatively you can take a ferry from Uno on the main island of Honshuu. I had spent some time researching islands on Japan-Guide; did I want to visit the Mediterranean Shodoshima, famous for its olives? The small, mostly mountainous island of Megijima, famous for its Ogre Cave (from the story of Momotaro)? Or perhaps Ogijima, with its one village, reportedly a collection of wooden houses connected by a confusing system of lanes? In the end, I decided on Naoshima -

Shikoku: Naruto's Whirpools and Takamatsu's Old Village

Last Friday was my favourite kind of national holiday - the kind that latches on to a weekend, giving me freedom to travel a little further out of Hamamatsu than I normally could. Japan is made up of four main islands, and so far - other than my soujourn to Hachijo-jima - I had not been off Honshu, the main island. For a long time, Jeff had wanted to visit another of the islands, in particular Shikoku. I didn't know much about Shikoku, other than that Haruki Murakami's Kafka on the Shorewas set in the very city that we would later stay in...
 
Armed with the internet and zero knowledge, I set about planning a 3-day trip. Unfortunately, time and money wouldn't allow us to travel too far into the depths of Shikoku, but we did manage to skim the surface while visiting two other cities on Honshuu on the journey. The plan - travel to Kobe on the Thursday night after work and stay at a hotel. The next day, we would take a bus from Kobe to Naruto, at the closest point of Shikoku. Here, we would marvel at Naruto's "famous" whirpools for a while before heading to Takamatsu (where Kafka is mainly set!). We would stay there for one night, and spend a part of the next day on Naoshima, a small island famous for art. From there we would travel up to Okayama and stay there for a night (I liked the look of the castle) before heading back our separate ways on Sunday.
 
So, Thursday came and off we went. Meeting in Maibara, we were in Kyoto by around 9pm. Using the JR trains all the way from Hamamatsu would normally take about 5 hours, but I was lazy and decided to splash out on the shinkansen to Maibara, before continuing on the JR trains. We walked around Sannomiya for a while, but to be honest there doesn't seem to be that much to do there. We spent some money in an izakaya, and Jeff showed me their "famous" flower clock... which, to be honest, was nowhere near as awesome as the totem pole lurking behind it! It was raining so we didn't stay out for long. 

Being a Broad

I thought I'd take a minute to tell all your foreign ladies out there about Being a Broad.

It's a support and information network for foreign women living in Japan, although Japanese ladies are also welcome to join. Set up in 1997 by the lovely Caroline Pover, Being a Broad holds girly nights out, careers seminars and other meetings in Tokyo every month. However, if you don't live in Tokyo, fear not! There are Being a Broad reps all over Japan, with events happening in various prefectures. Shizuoka prefecture's rep is my friend Ali (check her blog at http://haikugirl.wordpress.com/). They publish a magazine every month, which you can get hold of through a rep or view online from the website, and have an online forum where you can ask questions, find out about events or

Getting my Wisdom Teeth Out... in Japan

Major oral surgery... in a foreign country??

The very notion strikes fear into the hearts of many - be they xenophobic, odontophobic* or my parents. (*That's fear of teeth or dental surgery.) But when my teeth started hurting back in December, I decided that I had better get them checked out.. after all, I had already been told a few years ago that my bottom wisdom teeth were growing through impacted. After an X-ray, I was told that I should get ALL FOUR of my wisdom teeth removed.

Should I have them out in Japan? I wondered. Wouldn't it be easier to get them out in the UK? Well, it might have been cheaper, as the UK has the NHS (National Health Service, meaning that most medical care is free), although I don't know if dental surgery is covered for those over 18 or not in full-time education. Still, the thing about the NHS is that you normally have to wait months and months for an appointment - it would have been August or September 2011 by the time I could have had them out, plus I'd have to book a flight home. On the other hand, I had heard that in Japan they didn't like to use general anaesthetic, meaning that I would be awake during the operation. The thought of being conscious and aware while my gums were cut open and my teeth hacked out filled me with dread.

Reverse Culture Shock - Back to the U.K.

I couldn't believe that I was going back to the U.K., even if only for a few days. I had never been away from Britain for more than a week at a time before I came to Japan, but I quite quickly got used to the idea that I wasn't there anymore. I had adapted to thinking of the British isles as being miles away (I visualise the world map a lot, and my relative position on it), nine hours behind us, my old friends and family members reduced to pixels and occasional Skype conversations. The U.K. was no longer my reality... it was a memory which, like childhood, like school and family holidays and old TV programmes, I had lovingly crafted and distorted with my mind. Going back seemed surreal, like going back to school again, back to an old job. I tried to distract myself on the flight, getting myself back into the mood with English films, but as the plane began its descent onto British soil, I could not get my head around it.

The thing is, I might have been in Japan for nine months straight, but every night when I close my eyes, I inevitably dream in British. I am usually always somewhere back home, in Wales, as if my subconscious was never able to evolve past the landscape of my early years.

An Impromptu Day in Tokyo

Sorry, it's been a while! I arrived back in Japan on the 6th of January, after spending a few days back in the U.K. over Christmas. I was originally meant to fly out there on the 23rd of December. I had booked a hostel for the night, and paid for my shinkansen tickets in advance (as it is cheaper to do so), ready to head up to Tokyo on the evening of the 22nd after work, and to fly out the next morning.

Alas, it was not to be quite so easy. The U.K. had been covered in snow for a few weeks (and by covered, I mean a couple of inches, which to the British is a blizzard of epic proportions, just as a persistent temperature of 25C is considered an "Indian summer") and so a lot of flights were delayed or cancelled. The day before I was due to fly, the flight company emailed me and told me that my flight had been cancelled. Gripped with panic, I set about trying to call both company and travel agency. As it was around 4am in the U.K. at this point, I had little luck. Eventually I decided to spend the rest of my worldly wealth on another flight, if I could find one. I was lucky enough to find a flight with BA for the 24th for a relatively reasonable cost. Warned that this flight could also be cancelled due to the weather, I went ahead and booked it anyway. Shinkansen tickets and hostel reservation still standing, I decided to head up to Tokyo that night anyway, and book a second night at the hostel. Jenny was going to be coming with me anyway, she herself not flying out until the 24th. This left us both with an unforseen day together in Tokyo, to fill in whatever way we saw fit.

Crime, Safety and the Law in Japan

 

Foreigners Vs The Law of Japan

A couple of weeks ago, I met a friend at the train station with the intention of going for food. As she was tired and I had my bike, we thought that it would be harmless enough if she popped onto the back (there’s plenty of room) and held on tight for the two minutes that it would take to whizz around the corner. After all, we had done it a few times before, and seen countless pairs of giggling Japanese teenagers do the same.

Barely had we moved two feet, when two apparent Japanese civilians stopped us. I thought “ohh, they might be crazy people… or Mormons!” as they started talking to us. I had my foot on the pedal, ready to make my escape, when they flashed two police badges.