END OF BREAK

The rest of my time in Gunma was mostly spent engaged in my favourite pastimes of eating, sleeping, and watching films. And more sleeping. It reminded me of being back in Dublin those first few days. Bed, bed, and more bed.

And then an expedition at the end to another Ski slope, this one with over a metre of snow.
Everything was alright for the first two hours, it was snowing, so visibility wasn't so great. And then, WHITE.

I lost all sight of everyone else on the mountain, and of, well,everything! The wind was so hard that I wasn't even sure if I was still standing; moving or still. My experiences on a board went from too little snow to a BLOODY BLIZZARD! They had to close the mountain because the ski lifts were going to attempt loops. Before their gymnastics practice could happen though, some people were using themto get DOWN; as it had become more dangerous to ski down.

Anyway, you can see photos of the entire break here.

http://s114.photobucket.com/albums/n267/davidlmorrison/JapanAug2006toJul2007/Christmas2006/

New Year's Sa-ke

New Year's in Tokyo was.... interesting.

A big group of us went to Roppongi, which is infamous for being about as dodgy as Japan can get. Before we had even left the Metro station, we had come across the first of many DUMB AS SHIT Marines. How did you SURVIVE growing up? And then 10 metres from the station, I started hearing voices.

"Hashish-Hashish"

But no bodies to accompany them....

Not even very pale little Japanese boys wearing eyeliner, or little girls crawling out of wells.

"The Grudge" and "The Ring" being documentaries in their original Japanese form.

There was Mexican food (Tokyo having surprisingly few Japanese restaurants. Does Dublin have many “Irish” restaurants?), and dancing, and watching "dancing" and lots of laughing at other people's expense. And a bizarre set up on one floor whereby the men and women had to sit on separate couches, only there was no couch for the men.

Just as it ended, Erin and I left the rest and took a chance. We really wanted to see the fish market in Tokyo at it's busiest time, 5 to 7 a.m. Apparently the sight of Multi-Tonne Tuna being tossed through the air as people argue on price is well worth the lack of sleep. What a way to go, being decapitated by a flying dead Tuna. I'm sure it's happened. So we took the metro there, but, as expected, it was closed for the National Holiday. The restaurants weren't, so we had some of the BEST sashimi (raw fish) EVER. The monster feed was stunningly gorgeous, as was the Knife Master who was preparing it right in front of us.

Maybe he was just stunning.

Desert was provided by a Buddhist Temple we stumbled upon on the return to the station. We joined the crowd for the New Year's ceremony, and were poured a bowl of Sake at the end. It was just after sunrise, but it's very hard to say no to a guy on his 34,567th incarnation who has just blessed the unpleasantly early alcohol for you.

Completely knackered, there was another site I wanted to see.

New Year's is THE big holiday in Japan, and the first visit to a Shrine of the New Year is a grand occasion. We took the Metro to The Meiji Shrine

(First Emperor, and former father figure for the Japanese state, after Imperial rule was restored at the end of the 19th century; Hirohito's grandfather)

the most important Shrine (Shinto, not a Buddhist Temple) in Tokyo to see the first visitors of the New Year. Some wore Kimono, many were with their whole family, and all were deep in thought and prayer for a prosperous coming year.

The police were there just as crowd control at the front of the Shrine where people pray, but had to wear visors to protect them from the offerings being thrown at the Shrine.

A couple of days later, just before the Tokyo stock exchange opened, the Shrine to the god of business was the place to be.

Big Round Red Christmas

Erin lives about as far North of Tokyo as I live South of Osaka, so it was an easy journey to take. A bunch of us got together on Christmas Eve in one of her friend's houses and we found the temple to those little dolls whose left eye you paint before the New Year.

Daruma, the legendary founder of Shaolin King-Fu.

We think.

Going to the temple made us even more confused about whether you burn them or not, and if so, when. But we did meet a baseball team using the temple's steps for training, by which I mean running up and then falling down from exhaustion. Until they saw Ashlee, a blonde American with a camera. Then they came back to life,

some of them.
What made the day was the old man we met at the top. He's the reason we're even more confused about it. As he began to explain it: modelled on the legendary founder of Kung-Fu etc., he realised that he didn't actually have a clue himself!

This made us feel much better. If an old person in Japan doesn't understand or know something, thenit's not worth knowing. So goes the Gospel according to David. We walked down with him, and just before he drove off, he handed us a doll each! And then jumped in the car as a picture was attempted.

Legend of a man. Still not sure if I painted it properly....

The Emperor's New Birthday.

I took an overnight bus to Tokyo after work that Friday (22nd). Erin and I met the next morning to have a look at the Imperial Palace. The grounds are a massive walled enclosure that take up a big chuck of the centre of Tokyo, and normally the entirety of the grounds are closed to the public. They open twice a year, and one of those times, the Emperors Birthday, was that Saturday. So we arrive at on of the massive gates, and there is security everywhere. No barriers here, just lines and lines of police, sometimes with their arms linked.

Bit like a Céilí really.

X-ray machines, frisks, etc. And then we're allowed to get within 200m of the walls. BIG ASS STONE WALLS. Although they looked fun to climb.


Next comes the "not so secret" service. Towards the entrance gate, the crowd is funneled through a series of barriers, lined with men, and a tiny number of of equally severe looking women, all uniformly dressed in black trench coats, all with the eyes and a look that let you
know that they are taking in EVERYTHING. There's a lot of talk in Japan about security, but that's it, just talk. Their security is a joke, but in this case I think they were working on
the principle that they all knew what the three most wanted people in the country look like: two men and a women accused of involvement in the sarin gas attacks 10 years ago.

Still at large.

And standing right behind you.

Eventually inside the gates, and I realise that the grounds are not, in fact, open. Just a courtyard below a balcony surrounded by suspiciously thick glass... We're handed some crappy paper flags, and some old men start yelling "BANZAI!!!" when the Emperor and his family appear on the Balcony.


He looked like a Teddy Bear! This tiny old man with his sons towering over him (they've stepped backward above), taking in the crowd (old Japanese, and young foreigners, no young Japanese...) and thanking us for our Birthday wishes. Then, as quickly as it started, it was over and we were politely asked to
leave...release the hounds.


Ninja hounds.

So well trained in the arts that I couldn't even see them. But they were there...

I was disappointed. Not at the spectacle, that was all very interesting, but by the lack of crying. I wanted to see old men and women cry. Is that too much to ask?

http://s114.photobucket.com/albums/n267/davidlmorrison/JapanAug2006toJul2007/Christmas2006/

Not memory...

Good morning! (My time)

I can't really remember what happened in November..... not right now anyway......

I've had a stressful day dealing with the inadequacies of Japan's two main travel companies. Who would have thought that trying to book a Hotel at a ski resort that does, in fact, have vacancies would have been such a chore. After 2 hours of waiting while someone did unneccessary research

(No, I don't care what type of hot spring they have, so long as the chemical composition doesn't include sulphuric acid I'm happy. No, you don't have to check.)

At the end, just as I was about to hand over the money, it turned out that they place they had been talking up for so long wasn't even opening until mid-January! I think I managed my most sarcastic "Doomo Arigato" before I left to head home. The highlights of the day, which brought a smile as I took the train though, were the foot long sandwich for lunch and the success in finding armour plated underwear that fits.

The Vice Principal at my base school has organised a staff trip to a ski slope for some fun in the snow. In my case, since I began snowboarding in February and have just three days under my belt, and 8 months in between to forget everything, I expect my......everything?..... to ache like last year. Everything except my ass! Ha! Outsmarted you Gravity!

Another reason to smile is the back up plan for the school Holidays, which is more appealing than any other plan I've had. The original plan was to spend some days on a mountain until around new year, then go to Okinawa for a week of swimming, snorkelling et all. Thanks to
some folk on couchsurfing, and no thanks to travel agents, it doesn't look like we'll be going to Okinawa as it's too cold for the water stuff I like, even there. Also, after today, it doesn't look like we'll have any hotel booked in advance for the week after Christmas.

No panic though. The back up plan is to load my laptop with movies, get on a train to Tokyo and then to Erin's. Hang out there, break into the Emperor's palace, watch some films, rent a car and drive (She'll be driving, I'm navigating, relative strengths) to the slopes whenever we feel like it, eat ice cream when we don't, and have some fun in the snow. Preferably at high speed in a downward direction. She's a pretty damn good skier, and I'm a reckless ass armour clad snow boarder, so fun should be had.

There was another plan that I tinkered with.

Dublin.

Erin has a very romantic notion of Dublin, and I liked the idea of showing her around. Plus, she can drive, so I could show her some other spots as well. Again, me with the navigating, not the driving.

Relative Strengths. Very relative when one doesn't have a licence.

Or ability.

Apart from those epic lessons courtesy of Dad in August. But then again, the Dublin Sligo road is pretty easy now.

The qualification for that idea was price. Japan is expensive, and snow sports and Okinawan trips are more so, so for a while I thought that it might be the same price, or a little more, to fly home and offset the carbon. I was wrong. The flights, even before taxes came in, were well above what I would have been willing to pay. In fact, at about one months wages, well above what I would have been capable of paying.

So staying here.

I'm going to go through some photos to jog the noggin, upload them, and get back to you later.

daveeeeeed

or

day-beee-doooo

Never David theses days......

*sniff*

New Year's Frames

If I were anywhere on the correct continent, this is where I would be on New Years.

http://www.theframes.ie/

The first time I went was 31st December 2000, and it was a fatastic night. Highlights of successive years, all great, have been

Eating pizza in Tamsins kitchen at gods know what in the morning.

Kidnapping Kevin on the way to the gig

and Watching the band keep playing as the management scream for them to come off, already 15 minutes late.