Arigato, my gato.

After spending a day and two nights in Tokyo I took the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Kyoto, where I arrived in a guest house of a nice elderly Japanese couple. The room came with a kimono-type robe, which I donned for bathroom use, general lazing about, and a few karate poses (pictures to be posted soon). Kyoto, the former capital of Japan for a few thou years, was a nice change of pace from the big city craze of Tokyo. Just on the fringes of Kyoto are around 2,000 temples. I was feeling lazy so I could only see 1,999 of them, but that last one was supposed to be kinda whatever. No, in actuality I saw a bunch of temples, which are all somewhat similar but very peaceful, set in serene natural surroundings, with a pond here, a mountain there, a pagoda everywhere.

On my second day in Kyoto I pre-gamed my temple-hopping sojourn with my first Japanese sushi meal. Mmmmm, hmmm, how to describe? Awesome? Yes. Fish soft like butter? Yes. Sushi chef smoking? Yes. But I didn't care. The sushi was fabulous. Probably some of the best unagi and maguro (tuna) I've had. But I'm going to the fish market tomorrow morning to sample some of the super-fresh stuff so I will reserve judgment on the best sushi I've had until then. Over the next 8 hours I tore through Kyoto's temple scene like a man possessed -- climbed 2 mountains, too. Kinda overexerted myself, resulting in a groin injury and temporary limp (still with me). But I soldier on.

After all that trekking around, I landed myself in an onsen -- public bath house -- for a truly local experience. Just me and about 15-20 naked elderly Japanese men sweating it out in a variety of baths, from ball-scaldingly hot to nipple-shrinkingly cold. After sitting naked to wash myself on an insanely squat stool in front of a mirror with a bunch of the other men, I started things off in a jacuzzi of brown water, intrigued by the color. I realize many would stray from a tub of brown water in a public bath house, but I was not deterred, so found myself relaxing in the water, which gave off an aroma of cinammon. Next I journeyed to a pool which freaked me out because it made me start twitching involuntarily. I realized it had an electric current in it so I bounced to the rest and called it a night.

That night I met a very cool German guy named Christoph who I'm meeting up with tonight in Tokyo. After Kyoto I'd planned to go to Nara, the capital before Kyoto, but was persuaded by the advice of Christoph and others I'd met that Hiroshima was really something. So I boarded another Shinkansen yesterday and visited the Atomic Bomb Peace Museum there -- really quite something. Very moving, tragic, yet hopeful. There were specimens of peoples burned clothes, scars, melted-off skin and nails, etc. Not meant to be shocking, just tell it like it happened. People place bottles of water at the memorial statues around the museum because after people were burned from the bomb they were very thirsty but they weren't allowed to drink because it would kill them. Very sad, but I'm glad I went.

Quickly, a few things:

1) The food is consistently spectacular, but I'm rarely hungry. My theory: the food here is much more nutritious than that in the U.S. so a little bit fills me up a lot more than the same food would in America. Read Michael Pollan for more on the waning nutrion of American food.

2) Japan = utopia. People leave their bikes parked without locks for hours at a time because no one steals in Japan. Crazy.

3) Toilets. Finally found a stop button for the bidet. Next I need to find the butt warming button (seriously).

4) Nice people/food. Started chatting up a Japanese college student who I saw eating something tasty. He offered me an octopus ball (octopuses don't have balls; this was a fried ball of dough filled with octopus). He chaparoned me around for a while, catering to my every need. We shared some mochi (dough filled with ice cream) and fell in love. I want to be reincarnated as moshi. Like right now. He dropped me off at a conveyer belt sushi joint where I had some toro, maguro, salmon, and jackfish -- pretty decent stuff for the prices. I'm FULLLLLLL

About to wrap it up. Leave for Singapore tomorrow. 1 week is too little time to see all Japan has to offer.

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