Umeboshi ate my bento: touristing

mandag 30. juni 2014

Tokyo Tower Touristing

Having my Fabulous Fukuoka Friend Rakel in town last week gave me an excellent excuse to run around playing tourist for a bit. I really do not do this often enough at all, and so in the set of "things none of us have done yet" there was all kinds of attractions to choose from.

We chose Tokyo Tower, a 333m high broadcasting tower built to look like the Eiffel Tower but painted orange to comply with air safety regulations. Of course, the Japanese version is just a teensy bit taller than its 324m tall counterpart in France.

We R Toristz

For primarily economic reasons we only went up to the middle deck.

Having been up a few of the truly high rise towers in Tokyo, I have to say I think I prefer this middle altitude. The Tower is situated in a very interesting area, giving views of a large number of famous neighborhoods, and being at eye-level so to say with the skyscrapers meant that the views kept their personalities. In my experience, going too high means looking further but seing less.

Clusters of skyskrapers.

Of course, going high is always interesting just because of the thrill.

We found this tiny viewing window

Rakel refused to step on it.

Then we found this larger one.

She absolutely refused to step on this one. So do not be fooled, that is my lower body, even if it is Rakel's face.

Rakel turned distinctly green when I decided to jump up and down on the viewing window.

"should I try to look cool?"

"Naaah. I'll just be myself."

Cafés in places like this are always a bit over-priced, and yet always worth it.

Dat view.

And since it was a weekday with cloudy weather outside of the high-tourist-season, the usually hyper-crowded observation deck seemed downright peaceful. Quite relaxing, really.

That is, at least until the batshit crazy Japanese comedians started preforming.

I hope I do not sound narrow minded for saying this, but sometimes I just really do not understand Japanese humour. And that, I think, is not just because of the language barrier.

But anyway.

Dat view, amIright?

lørdag 7. juni 2014

Kyoto finale: Heat wave, and kimono kimono kimono kimono!

Edit: Oh well screw you too blogger! I had written this blog post long and pretty, and then boom. All deleted. I have tried every trick I know to recover it but no dice. I cannot rewrite it the way it was, but I'll get something up. Okay. Damnit. Let's go.

So Sunday dawned bright and hot, and my group of 'weegies could definitelly feel it as we set out to do touristy things.

Are you a fan of fans? I sure am. I am a fan fan.

It was the kind of heat I have not felt for a goody long time.

It is a little known fact, but Norwegians may actually melt in the sun.

The ubiquitous "they" say this is only the beginning.

"Blaaaaah it's so hot!"

If that is true, I see much sweaty complaining in my future.

Waaaateeeer....

"What is with this heat?"

Just kidding though (kinda). I'd take this over butt-freezing -20 any day.

Also, this made me giggle:

"In Japan..."

The main event was of course the very highly touristy one.

The kimono rental place was a small house in a back alley, backed to the brim with gorgeous fabrics and accessories in every colour. Female customers could choose between three packages of increasing price, number of options and general fancyness.

Then they looked at me, did a double take, and looked at me again. For a woman of my impressive stature (almost 172cm...), the only choice was the most expensive option, and my choices were limited to a rack of seven-ish kimonos. They were all really beautiful, but still...

Eventually I did manage to pick out all the pieces that go together to make a kimono, and got to spend 20ish rather awkward minutes being dressed by a woman whose head bobbed around in the general area of my elbow. I tried to bend down to help her when she adjusted my collar, but she would have none of it. She tightened, adjusted, folded, tightened, folded, prodded and voila:

Of course, at this point I'm wearing so many layers of belts (and an actual towel!) around my waist that I'm feeling distinctly huge. Kimono, while so elegant and feminine, are not particularaly conservative of the female form.

We also got our hair fixed to match, and this was done with a level of efficiency and skill I can only envy. I have never seen my hair be so... managable.

Also, blue dangly head-flower. I love dangly!

The guys were looking particularly dapper. I made them strike a Japanese manly-pose.

We were finally ready to go on a wibbly-wobbly walking tour of the neighbourhood.

This being Kyoto, I would have thought people used to seing groups like ours, but it did get to a point where I was wondering if we were the tourists or the attractions, and all the attention was making me incredibly giggly.

The sun was so bright it made taking good pictures difficult, and we were all sweating profously after only a short walk. Or at least, the girls were. The guys looked perfectly comfortable.