Random phone pictures

I've been trying to clear some space on my phone's internal memory which has meant moving all the pictures I've taken with it to its miniSD card. I don't like the camera much cos it's pretty poor (not just the low resolution, but also the lack of focus, dodgy colours and blown highlights) so I rarely look at photos after I take them. Here are some of the better ones from the past year since I got the phone.

Projector heaven

Ask any film fan what their ideal way to watch a film is and they should all reply "a projector". We have "borrowed" a PJ from the chemistry department and hooked it up to my PC. We customised a sheet (read: cut it up) to act as a screen and hung it from a string at ceiling level. Certainly a crude setup (not least cos my room is tiny), but we were pleased to discover that with as little as a 2ish metre throw distance we got a nicely in-focus 45" picture. This obviously makes my 19" TFT screen now look tiny.

So far what we've watched has been fairly random: Evil Dead 2, Futurama and Bad Boys. Cos this is a data projector it's got a nice XGA resolution which means that the HD trailers from places such as Dave's Trailer Page look amazing. I'd pretty much made my mind up to buy a projector anyway, but this has confirmed to me how much more imersive films can be. Also it's helped me to be be wary of DLP projectors. In these, coulour is produced by a spinning colour wheel which can lead to a phenomenen know as the rainbow effect, where flashes of rainbows are seen in areas of high contrast. Both Blondie and I can see them, but thankfully we're not sensitive to them. Some unlucky people suffer migrane-like reactions to them in as little as 10 minutes and need several days to recover. Whilst they didn't have this effect on me, I'd still get annoyed by them - especially if I'd just fropped almost £1000 on a projector. LCD seems the way to go.

We're going to try and get the Lord of the Rings films done cos they definitely benefit from the big screen treatment. One other problem is the amount of heat this thing kicks out (it's something like a 1000lumen bulb) - it certainly didn't help the 30^oC temperatures in my room.

My final term

The last few weeks have seen our final term in Durham (our 21st!) come to an end. This year I've been drifting further away from college and this term was no different. From the very first week back in April, we'd miss dinners to go out with Chemists, I came home for a stag weekend, spent 15 days in Japan and then more time away for the wedding. I managed to stick to my beliefs and boycott the summer ball (finally). Is it really worth paying £60 to get pissed in college? We did it for free in the New Inn and the Bailey.

The only event we went to was End of Session formal where even though I had to work an hour at the bar, I still had a great time talking to a wide range of friends around the quad and then head into Rixies with a load of people - including all 3 of my housemates from the 4th year. I never would have thought we'd all still be here back in October 2002.

Graduation week came and went. Amazingly, we won a last-minute invitation to the Graduands dinner. Luckily we got to sit on a table of 4th years that we knew, but hadn't talked to in ages so we had a great time. Then alumni weekend was upon us. The term weekend is really a misnomer since a lot of people don't (or can't) arrive till late on the Friday and then everyone is kicked out by 10am on the Sunday so it's basically one day of seeing olf friends and then getting battered at an old-style formal (no restrictions, cork throwing allowed). It was great to see my friends, even though I'd seen most of them a few weeks earlier. Had I left after my 3rd year, I'd no doubt be talking to the same groups, but my extra years here have allowed me to makes loads of really good friends in all the subsequent years and it was great to see them again.


Unfortunately, I don't really remember talking to a lot of them as Saturday night turned into a massive blur.

Now Blondie and I have the summer to finish up in the lab and get our theses written. Leaving is going to be very hard after all this time, but it's the right thing to do. It's all too easy to want to stay on because we've got so many good memories and had some great times, but the fact is next year we would feel very very old and really not know anyone in college so it would mean our memories of Trevs would be tarnished by a lacklustre year. By leaving now, we've had 6 amazing years and a year of coming to terms with moving on which is a lot more than most people get.

Good news everybody! Futurama to return

In the last day, it's been announced that my favorite tv show ever, Futurama, is to be revived and another series made. Listening to the commentaries on the DVDsets of the show, it seems that from as early as the 3rd episode in, the Fox executives didn't like it.
The show premiered in 1999 and told the story of Philip J Fry, a 20 something loser from New York, who was accidentally cryogenically frozen untill the year 2999. He eventually finds his distant reletive, Hubert Farnsworth - a 159 year old inventor who runs a delivery service. Initially, the show generated a lot of controversy over the characters of Bender and Hermes Conrad. Hermes was alleged to be a racist stereotype of Jamacans whilst Bender was an antihero - he stole, drank, gambled and smoked. Show creators Matt Greoning and David X Cohen brushed it off by saying that the show asn't aimed at the same age group as The Simpsons.
Whilst Futurama is based 1000 years in the future, most of the comedy revolves around the fact that things haven't really changed. Certain things are given a slight futuristic twist (for example in the future, owls have replaced rats as vermin) Celebrities from today are kept alive as heads in jars allowing the usual culture references. In the first episode we are introduced to the suicide booth - a telephone kiosk esque device that aids suicides. Instead of the legend of Atlantis, we are told of the legend of Atlanta - the state which was transported to sea and then sank. Most of the writers of Futurama hold PhDs or masters degrees in mathematics and science and this has lead to a large range of nerd jokes that geeks like me can pick up on. For example in one episode a horse race is so close they have to examine the photo finish on the electron microscope to which Farnsworth angrily exclaims "No fair! You changed the outcome by measuring it" citing Heisenberg's uncertainty principle and in another Bender launches a dating agency that is "dicreet and discrete". Some of the jokes are sogeeky that I only got them once I'd heard the commentry track - for example, Bender's apartment number means something in ASCII and one of the alien alphabets is a modular addition code after fans cracked the first one within minutes of the first episode airing.
The main reason the show is so repected by it's fans is that, like Scrubs, it can turn from comedy to drama at the drop of a hat. Episodes such as Luck of the Fryrish and Jurassic Bark have the most perfect, heart-breaking endings that shows like the Simpsons just can't even dream of producing. Groening and Cohen had also mapped out some long plot arcs that were very subtley put into place as soon as the first episode and then had hidden references made several times before they were revealed in the last season (hint - look at the shadow on the floor underneath the desk every time we see Fry fall into the cryogentic compartment). This kind of foresight implies that they had a lot more ideas, but unfortunately cancellation meant that most of them had to be quickly resolved in the 4th season.
The sad thing is that, The Simpsons used to be the best show on television, but soon became more and more wacky (exactly the kind of thing that could be rationalised in Futurama) and less and less witty over time. Futurama was screwed over by Fox who moved it around the schedules and often sports games overran episodes meaning some episodes couldn't be seen in some states. It was picked up for syndication by the Cartoon Network's Adult Swim channel (that also picked up Family Guy and Ghost in the Shell: SAC) and proved to be the most popular thing on the channel - often beating what Fox was showing. It was announced that a series of straight to DVD movies would be made and today the announcement of another run of 13 shows was made. Unfortunately, they won't air until 2008, but hopefully the movies should arrive before that. For all things Futurama, head over to Can't get enough Futurama.

Our lite entertainment for the summer

One of the few disappointments of Japan was the fact that the Nintendo DS lite was so hard to find. Nearly all the electronics shops had sold out and those that had stock were selling at the full rrp of 16,800yen (£80). I've heard that this console is the fastest selling of all time. In addition to this the games were £20 and we'd need stepdown convertors (Japan runs at 100V and some devices are so sensitive that even the US standard of 110V would damage them so the UK's 240V was a big no-no). Although I returned emptyhanded I had seen a good deal from Australia. From £100 including shipping we could get the DS lite and a copy of the new Mario game a month before they were available in the UK (and £25 cheaper). As an extra bonus, Australia also runs at 240V so we just needed an adaptor plug. The systems turned up a mere 5 days after ordering (and no import tax) so Blondie and I have been in gaming nirvana ever since. He's picked up Tiger Woods 2005 and Bomberman and I've aquired Mario Kart. The nice thing about DS games is that you don't each need a copy of the game to play multiplayer. In addition, Nintendo has negotiated loads of free wifi hotspots across the country where you can play people across the world for free. To my surprise there are loads in Durham including the New Inn, 24 North Bailey and even Chad's JCR. Nintendo have also dropped region protection, so games from anywhere in the world will work in all DS'.

After being out of gaming for the best part of 10 years since the SNES it feels weird going back in (Gamecube, DS lite and next up: the Wii). Still this time around I'm far more frugal so I should be able to get the games a lot cheaper. Initially I doubted how good the DS was. I mean, a dual screen handheld with a touch screen? But there are some really innovative games out such as Pheonix Wright (a Japanaese lawyer simulator where you do things like shout objection into the built in microphone) and Trauma Centre (where you perform operations on the touch screen) and the newly released Brain-Training that has got most of Japan hooked. Nintendo proclaim they're trying to appeal to the non-gamer and with the demographics of those playing Brain Training in Japan, they may be onto a winner...

Have a look at the E3 promos for the Wii here and here. I think the reason I lost interest in gaming was it was becoming so bland. Now the xBox360 is just a jumped up PC and the PS3 is going to cost nearly £500 (for a games console!!!) where as Nintendo are doing something different (and cheap - 25,000yen/$250 max). The video speaks for itself.

My best friends' wedding

A few weeks ago a group of us from Durham travelled down from Essex to the wedding of our university friends Mark and Catherine. They've been together for 5 and a half years and engaged for 4 years. Ever since they got together whilst we all lived together in Wynyard Grove, none of us doubted this day would eventually come. It was almost a waiting game for us until they became a couple as soon as we found out they shared the same birthday.

Blondie, Tim and I travelled down in Blondie's Saab on a pretty laid back road trip. We travelled down to Crystal Palace to stay with Mel where we were warmly welcomed. The next day we set off to Vaulty Manor, close to Tiptree where Catherine is from. We arrived with plenty of time to spare and settled into our "family" accommodation block. Gradualy we started seeing old friends milling around and eventually we filed into the main hall. There were two ladies officiating, one of whom just starred at me. I turned to Mel to point this out and when I looked back she was giving me real evils. Strange. Both Mark and Catherine looked very laid back and relaxed and everything went to plan.

After signing the register they posed for photos inside and outside, before they were lead away to let their photographer have his way with them whilst we set about the bucks fizz. The former Trevs students were easily identified as those going back for repeat visits to the alcohol table. This was the part where I got to chat to loads of peope I haven't seen in years. It's really sad because I haven't really kept in contact with a lot of them. They're on my MSN list, but I always fall into the "if the want to talk to me, they'll start a chat" trap. These are the people that I lived with for 3 years and pretty much saw every day. We grew together, finding out who we were, laughed and cried together and I was really close to several of them. It's far too easy to drift away from these people, but it made me resolve to try harder to keep in touch with them. After all, they formed a massive part of an important part of my life. The year after they left (2002-3) I essentially started again at Trevs and it's been nearly 4 years since then. Needless to say after 4 years of working, most of them can't even imagine what it's like to live as a student anymore as we PhDers do.


Eventually Mark and Catherine reappeared for the group photos. We only appeared in one so we took the time to explore around the hall. Finally, the photographer was done and Mark and Catherine were free to mingle with the guests. We were then called into the dining hall for the lunch, consisting of a fantastic salmon/prawn starter and lamb main. I was sat on a table of half Trevs, half Mark's friends whom we had been paintballing with a month or so earlier. Of course, I'd brought my camera and for some reason I seemed to be on it and got a lot of pretty good pictures - you can see the complete set by clicking on any of them.


The centre-piece of each table was a metre long vase with flowers that had all the ex-students thinking the same thing - trophy. The banter was entertaining and in no time it was time for the speeches. Catherine's father decided to go hi-tech and gave a powerpoint presentation to delve into Catherine's past. The fact he is a teacher played up in the style of talk and the over-dinner quiz. Next up was the best man - Mark's brother, David. His speech was short and to the point and then it was left up to Mark to wrap up which he did well.

After the cake was cut we returned to the main hall for more drinks before some free time during which we sat and chatted more. Eventually the evening buffet was served before fireworks outside and the obligatory cheesy DJs introduced the first dance of the new Mr and Mrs Carrington. The bar wasn't too badly priced for a southern wedding venue (although £3/pint still hust).

Things wound down at midnight and we were ejected. On the way out we spied the "yard" vases and one of them accompanied us back to one of the bedrooms where the drinking continued with the aid of the vase.


The next day dawned with the prospect of being kicked out of our rooms at 9.30. Thankfuly we were all up and made our way to the breakfast room for brunch. Soon after, people began drifting off. Thankfully, there's an alumni weekend in a few weeks so it won't be too long before I see people again. We drove Mel to visit her grandmother in Theydon Bois and went for a walk around the local wood. It was fantastically hot day. It's probably a good thing the wedding wasn't a day later cos although the photos would have looked better, it would have been uncomfortably hot.
Eventually we piled back into the Saab (after having to disable the alarm due to a beeper fault) and tore back through East Anglia and up the M1 back to Durham.

Japan entries complete

I've finally got around to sorting through all my photos from Japan and getting them onto Flickr. There's a link to all my photos on the right hand side of my blog, or you can just click on a picture in or after the Japan entries and be taken there by the magic of the internet eeeeee! I've also gone through and tidied up the writing style a bit to compensate for the dodgy keyboard on my laptop which spontaneously misses out random letters (thankfully, this problem has now been fixed) so the entries might actually make more grammatical sense!

It's over

All the photos are coming along - I've over half way through. In the mean time I'm happy to report that after 9 months of blood, sweat and many many tears, Blondie and I have finally finished Super Monkey Ball 2. The final level of world 10 was conquered on Tuesday leading to mass celebrations. Hopefully this means the level of swearing in the house will be drastically reduced.

An overview of Japan

It's been a week since I arrived back in the UK so I've had time to readjust. Now, for some reason, I've been unaffected by jet-lag on both journeys which is something I'm very thankful for - my theory of hardcoring it until nighttime in the country of arrival seems to have paid off. One of the things that struck me most about my trip was that I simply wasn't hit by culture shock at all - I know I was only there for 2 weeks, but for most of the second week I was by myself and had to communicate in Japanese and get by myself in their society. Perhaps I had expectations of ultra-wackiness, perhaps England is getting more outrageous, perhaps learning Katakana before I went ensured that I wasn't completely isolated - who knows. I've never really considered myself to be well-traveled, but it has now occurred to me that I've been to a lot of cities around the world, so maybe new places don't intimidate me the way I expect them to. Certainly in Japan I felt lots of similarities to Mumbai and European cities. In fact it may be safe to say I experienced more severe reverse-culture shock. Or it may just have been the crushing disappointment of sharing a departure gate with a load of drunk Geordies who were returning from Amsterdam, the dirty, unreliable Metro and finally the complete lack of trains anywhere after 10pm from Newcastle. Not what I really needed after experiencing the upmost efficiency and then 14 hours on planes.

Japan itself is a series of contradictions and I'll give you a few examples. Recycling seems to be a big part of everyday life with different bins surrounding most conbinis and vending machines, but then the massive use of non-reusable chopsticks is putting pressure on wood supplies. Things like food, drink, local travel and everyday items are very cheap (the prospect of having to pay £3.69 for a sandwich at a service station this weekend had me launch into a rant), yet something as simple as a CD or DVD will set you back one and a half times what we pay. Maintaining face and honor are big here, yet drinking is encourageed at every possible juncture - witness the conference poster sessions with no water; only beer. The number of mum-ra'd businessmen I saw being carried home through the streets of Osaka as though it was the most normal thing in the world was certainly baffling. Japan is famous for being one of the mst technologically advanced countries, yet hardly anywhere takes credit cards, Japan lags behind Scandinavia in terms of internet connections and Japanese mobile phones aren't as advanced as you'd think. Western models can now rival, if not beat the Japanese equivalents.
The biggest thing though were the people. In the UK we have history all around us - from castle remains all the way through to the blue plaques on buildings throughout the country. It is something we can be proud of without caring too much. In Japan, the recorded history doesn't really start until the 8th century, with the country descending into anarchy until reunification in 1600. The Japanese seem obsessed with their history to a massive extreme. Major tourist attractions are actually recreations of the originals - Osaka castle, the golden pavilion, Todaiji temple at Nara. It's sort of the equivalent of us putting Stone Henge back together. The sites have become such tourist traps that a lot of the wonder that should exist around them is lost in the swarm of school tours. It seems like a lot of the events and visits that unfold arise because of tradition rather than an actual affinity for the past or religion. A good Western example of this is Christmas - now it's simply a winter festival that has lost all of it's meaning. It's now simply tradition and unfortunately if we ever stop the commercialism of it our economy would head south pretty fast.
I'd read about widespread discrimination against foreigners and I can certainly believe it's true. Whilst in the west, different nationalities can blend in, in Japan they stand out. We drew some strange looks as we walked through some of smaller areas of Osaka. I have to say though, that I found the people of Osaka to be by far the most welcoming, always offering us a smile and trying to help us if we looked too confused. Kyoto was another matter. I've read that it's citizens even regard Japanese not from the area as gaijin. The sheer number of foreigners trapesing through the city must aggravate the locals (especially with the loud Americans). People in Tokyo seemed more understanding of foreigners due to the higher concentration of gaijin who work in the city. Japan has certainly opened up to the world since the war, but it is still an insular country. Perhaps the lack of ethnic diversity has helped the country - everyone is Japanese so they all have their sense of honor, which helps keeps the crime rate down and traditions alive.

The trip has reconfirmed to me that it can really suck travelling by yourself. From having noone to talk to (1/3 of a learn Japanese book isn't too helpful when trying to strike up conversations), to having to ask people to take your photo all the time and then sitting by yourself in restaurants like the strange old man that every pub in the UK has...
I definitely want to go back - perhaps to the famous Sapporo Snow Festival held in February every year - especially if I can climb onto the ANA/JAL 10000yen flights. It may have to be fairly soon though. Due to heavy US pressure, Japan will be adopting the tactic of fingerprinting any foreign national who enters the country from November 2007...

Anyway - I'm working hard to edit my photos and tidy up all the blog entries. Hopefully within the next week... In the meantime enjoy this video of me negotiating the famous Shibuya crossing. I won't embarrasss Angharad by posting her karaoke video - I know I was just as bad as she was!

Tokyo

Sunday 28th May
I managed to lie in past my alarm. Lacking the time (and, once again, hot water) to shave has left me looking like Grizzly Adam. I make my way to the front desk to sign out and deposited yet another postcard of Durham. As I wait for my train, a sense of panic starts to dawn over me - I haven't really checked the airport train timetimes and have assumed 20 minutes from the Ryokan to Tokyo eki. As I reach the Yamanote line after 20 minutes I realise it'll be another 20 minutes from here...En route I decide on the Keisei line Skyliner. I arrive at Nippori station and head upstairs as fast as possible. By some miracle I manage to get a ticket and get onto the waiting train within 2 minutes - my sense of panic evaporates immediately - the timing will now be just about perfect so I settle down to enjoy the ride out of Tokyo. The Lost in Translation OST blares out of my iPod and eventually we pull into the basement of Narita. Immediately there is a security check - this is one of the few places in Japan where they take no chances over security. They are not worried about international terrorism, but from attacks from their own citizens - many were opposed to the forcible evictions in the area due to construction of the airport and many violent conflicts delayed the building of the airport by several years. The protesters then built towers to obstruct the approach of planes from the north. The second runway was only recently completed and in order to avoid a repeat of the conflict, the government had to shorten the runway to a length which left it unable to cope with 747s - which seems pretty useless. Plans for a shinkansen line to the airport were also scrapped.

A series of elevators lead upto the 4th floor check in area. My tactics of looking vaguely smart (well, trousers and my "presenting" jacket) did nothing to get me upgraded to first class for the simple reason that KLM don't actually have a first class... After picking up some last minute o-miyage I passed through passport control and left Japanese soil. Unfortunately I ended up spending more time on international soil than planned. As I arrived at the gate, the queues that had formed for boarding dissipated and we were told that due to "technical reasons" we would be delayed for 2 hours. Outside the rain was still coming down and watching planes take off was an interesting sight. As soon as they got up to speed on the runway, vapour trails formed at the wing tips and as they rotated to takeoff, huge waves of water could be seen rushing over the leading edge of the wing.

The cloud was so low that departing planes vanished from sight a few hundred feet from the ground. Landing planes kicked up an impressive amount of spay as soon as reverse thrust was applied. After a while we were informed that we'd be given a complementary lunch. This turned out to be a 100yen (50p) bottle of water...

Eventually we boarded and once the doors were locked the captain informed us that the reason for the delay was because the plane had received a lightning strike on it's journey into Narita and needed extras safety checks. Too late to escape. Eventually we left 2 hours late. By this time the weather had become very pleasant and the tarmac was almost dry. We took off and headed south over the coast before turning around and flying north to Sapporo and heading out over the sea of Japan towards Siberia.

The food was exactly the same as on the way out - and we didn't get nearly enough. By 9pm Japanese time we were offered the choice of a small tub of ice cream or a pot noodle - hardly a substantial dinner. The 11 hour flight flew by (sorry) and before I knew it we were flying over southern Scandinavia and descending toward Schiphol. Once again, despite drinking copious amounts of fluids and spending 12 hours on board, I had again avoided my pet hate of going to the toilet on a plane. Of course, the 2 hour delay meant that I had missed my connection to Newcastle, but thankfully there was another flight at 9pm. The short haul European flights are really bad after the experience of an intercontinental long haul flight. The planes are tiny, the seats don't recline at all and the sound of hungover Geordies swearing fills the plane. After one of the worst landings I can remember we are back in the UK. Amazingly my luggage has also made the complete return journey and I set about heading to the Metro to get into Newcastle. Within 5 minutes of setting off we are told that the brakes are failing and the train must be removed from service. A proper welcome back to England. I eventually arrive back at central station at 10pm and there are no trains. Not just no trains to Durham, but no trains anywhere. This really is like some kind of bad joke; 10pm isn't that late at all and there aren't even any local trains to Doncaster or Sunderland. I give in and just get a taxi. As I get back to Durham at 11pm my phone's alarm goes off to indicate 24 hours since I woke up in that small Ryokan in a small southern Tokyo suburb. This has actually been the longest day of my life - 32 hours long, but I've managed to make it until night time in England so hopefully the jet lag should have been beaten... My room looks like a bomb site as I go to bed at 1.30am BST, but I don't really care.


Saturday 27th May
I once again woke to the pitter-patter of rain at the window. For my last full day in Tokyo I decided to try see a bit more of the city so I got the train out to Shibuya. This held several fascinations for me. First off, it's probably best known for having purportedly the world's busiest pedestrian crossing outside the station and the world's busiest Starbucks overlooking it.

My main reason for visiting though is not this. Viewers of Matt Groening's space-age comedy Futurama should be familiar with the episode Jurassic Bark. The story was influenced by the story of Hachi-ko a dog who met his master's train at the same time every day. When his master died at work one day in 1925, Hachi-ko kept on returning to Shibuya station at the same time every day until his death in 1935. He had become such a celebrity that a statue was erected outside the station. Being a massive Futurama fan (it pisses over The Simpsons) this was too good an opportunity to miss out on. In fact, the station exit is even named the Hachi-ko entrance. The crossing itself is indeed pretty busy, but the area is actually much smaller than you'd think. A mile up the road is Yoyogi Park where I stopped for some yaki-soba from a road-side vendor. A large number of people were passing by and the sound of music could be heard. Firstly I thought it could be to do with the MTV Japan music awards taking place later that night at the adjacent national stadium, but then a fellow tourist informed me that the many flags around the area were those of the Japanese communist party.


Further up the road is the Meiji Jingo Shrine - home of the largest wooden Torii of it's kind in Japan. Despite the fact that the shrine was open to the public, there was a traditional Japanese wedding in progress. As I walked back to Shibuya I decided to abandon the few moral values I have and go into Starbucks for the classic view of the Shibuya crossing. I very much doubt that it is the busiest store in the word as it's literally the size of a potting shed as it's tacked onto the side of a music/film shop. The highest customer:volume ratio, however, I would accept. I wait at the top of the stairs, but everyone is extremely reluctant to move. The place is worryingly full of Americans sitting studying Japanese kanji. Eventually a table becomes free and as I sit and as I drink my reassuringly expensive cocoa I watch the crossing.

It's only a couple of minutes between pedestrians being allowed to cross, but every time the pavements are filled with waiting people. The entire scene is reminiscent of that from the Laughing Man incident in Stand Alone Complex (although that was set in Kobe) and the scene plays out in Lost in Translation too (in this case, they filmed illegally from Starbucks). As I reach the bottom of my ever-increasingly dense cocoa, I start to doubt that this place even has a high customer:volume ratio as people sit transfixed, their drinks long since finished, staring out at the crossing and 5 storey high video screens. Eventually I brave the crossing again and take the long way around the Yamanote line to the central Tokyo station to visit the Imperial Palace and gardens. First I pass the international convention centre - not as large as the Grand Cube, put very futuristic none the less. Another large Bic Camera store attracts me in, the large screen LCD displays showing off the HD broadcasts that are transmitted in Japan. Again, the mere mention of GPS confuses all the sales reps. I continue on to the Imperial Palace and the weather continues to deteriorate and by the time I arrive, visibility is down to a few hundred metres.

Walking through the gardens I spot the Tokyo Tower in the distance and make the foolish decision to walk to it. Forty five minutes later and it seems as far away as it was when I started. Finally I reach it. It certainly is tall and a single ground level photograph is the only thing I take away from the encounter. Thankfully, the density of stations means that I don't have to repeat the walk back to Tokyo eki. I arrive back at the Ryokan just as the heavens open. Now seems to be the perfect time for a Japanese style bath. The weather rules-out the open air bath so I head across the complex to the indoor bath. The etiquette is simple, the bath tub is designed for soaking and relaxing, so around the large bath are lots of taps and showers. The idea is that you go in and soap your self up all over and then wash all the dirt and suds off so that when you finally enter the bath you are already clean. As I enter there already several people in the bath. I strip off and sit in the corner scrubbing for a good five minutes before I finally feel ready to enter the bath. I'm not sure how the water is kept hot, but it's an absolutely perfect temperature. I relax into it alongside the other bath-goer. After 5 minutes, he's had enough and departs leaving me alone. I'd read that it's good to get out and repeat the washing phase which I do. Once again, getting into the bath is an amazing experience and my mind completely clears. 15 minutes or so pass before I decide I'm relaxed (and wrinkly) enough and dress in my yukata and return to my room.

By this time it's too late to get into a restaurant so I head to the local conbini and stock up on some interesting looking food for the princely sum of about £5. One of the items was a pack of chicken yakitori. First up was the standard yotsumi (chicken), next was torikawa (chicken skin) and finally what appeared to be nankotsu (balls of chicken containing cartilage). The last of these was too much as the crunch of cartilage just is not pleasant no matter which way you look at it. I settled down to cram all my clothes and o-miyage into my bags whilst wasting time on YouTube and GoogleVideo. I still wasn't sure how I was going to get to the airport - £15 on the JR line or £8 on the Keisei line...


Friday 26th May
The early morning waking had now completely worn off. As I came back from the shower room I discovered that all the taps in my building were refusing to dispense hot water so shaving wasn't an option. Today was my first day to get a really good look around Tokyo. The city is simply a collection of smaller towns that happen to be near each other. I took the circular Yamanote line back to Shinjuku. My Wikitravel guide had tipped me off to the presence of the viewing platforms on the 45th floor of the Metropolitan Government Building.

It may not be the tallest building in the city, but free certainly beets the 1500 yen asked at other high spots. Thankfully, there was an underground walkway that lead from one of the station's many exists straight to the building itself. The express elevator took me upto the platform which combined several tacky souvenir shops and an overpriced cafe with the views. The views were fantastic although the haze on the horizon obscured the view of Fuji-san once again. The south tower also had a viewing gallery, this time with a view over the east of the city. From here I was able to look down onto the advert-plastered Shinjuku, the minuscule-by-comparison Tokyo Tower and out to the harbour. I walked back the post office to change some more money. The post office adopts a similar system to the Norwegian equivalent - ticket-based service with lots of chairs to wait in - none of the British-style queuing in lines.

From here I walked all the way through Shinjuku. Tokyo doesn't crowd you as much as I was expecting. Places like London make you feel small, crowded and insignificant - often fighting for space with the other pedestrians. Tokyo on the other hand offers wide pavements, lots of greenery; parks, hedgerows on the roadside and frequent wooded shrines. With the very low crime rate (petty crime that is, organised crime is still rampant), you feel perfectly safe wandering around looking like the kind of lost tourist that appears at the start of Batman. From the far end of electric street I walked back through one of the many park/bird sanctuaries. After some lunch I caught the Chou line across town to Akihabara.

Known throughout the world as the best place to buy any kind of electronic equipment, the truth however is that with the advent of stores like Bic Camera at many other towns in Tokyo, Akihabara isn't quite the same force it once was. In fact, browsing around, the prices aren't even as competitive as I was expecting - the main things I was after were impossible to find in the right circumstances. My search for a new small camera ended in frustration as I found all the models were essentially the same price as the UK (or even more expensive!), the Nintendo DS Lite was still in short supply 2 months after launch so those few stores that stocked them were charging full rrp - add in the cost of a stepdown charger and there's no reason not to get a cheaper model from Australia and my quest for a bluetooth GPS unit met with blank responses from all the staff I asked. The real change in Akihabara has been towards manga. And by manga I mean hentai/porn. Even the electronic stores had basement sections offering DVDs & Manga with suggestive posters plastered over the walls (and some beyond suggestive). After a while I headed back towards the city centre to a musical instrument zone. There is a high concentration of guitar shops that quickly attracted my attention. Given the high number of Japanese guitar maestros on the internet (look here and here for examples) I was expecting these place to be rammed with ridiculous guitars and people trying them out. To my disappointment they all seemed to stock budget brands I've never heard of and the standard Fenders and Ibenez models. The potential buyers trying out the wares are also lacking a bit in the talent department. I'm not saying I'm much better, but most of my guitar shop experience revolves around Musical Exchanges/Sound Control in Birmingham where some amazing player go to try out guitars. I walk back to Akiba and have another walk around as the sun goes down and the neon switches on. As the sun sets completely I head back to Shinjuku to get a night time view over the city from the Government Tower. From the 45th floor, the lights seem to go on forever and the city stretches out into the distance. The restaurant has now turned into a high priced bar complete with pianist to accompany the views.

I decide to take a different path back to the station which turns out to be a mistake as I wander through busy streets for half an hour, eventually ending back at the massive Bic Camera store. This is the Tokyo from films - the bright neon and massive crowds of people. What isn't seen though is that this never feels overwhelming and the crowds aren't out for a big night (well, some businessmen are out for dinner and a night of drinking and karaoke) but they are simply coming home from work and doing some shopping (shops don't close until 8pm).


Thursday 25th May
Back in the late 1980s, ITV showed an animated film one December Saturday morning. I watched it and was enthralled as it differed from the formulaic stuff Disney churned out. I didn't realise it until 2002, but it had been my first experience of a Studio Ghibli film. The entire reason I'd extended my stay in Japan to include Tokyo was so I could visit the Ghibli museum in the suburb of Mitaka.

The weather was set perfectly after the storm the night before and I was soon strolling down the canal from Mitaka station towards to exclusive museum. So exclusive is it that foreigners need to apply for tickets in advance specifying the day and passport numbers of those attending and if these don't match reality, entry is denied. Needless to say I'd booked my tickets months before. Upon arrival I was greeted by Totoro in a faux ticket office. Around the corner at the real ticket counter my advance ticket is swapped for my actual museum ticket, consisting of three frames from an actual reel of a Ghibli film. Mine came from 2002 release The Cat Returns. Walking down the stairs and I'm in the world of Miyazaki. The supplied leaflet declares - there are no paths, let's get lost together. None of the displays are in English, but it doesn't matter. The first room is devoted to how animation works - from how introducing a strobe can create the illusion of movement in several Ghibli themed examples, to how a film projector converts single images into a 24fps film. Moving upstairs leads to a recreation of Miyazaki and Takahata's work areas. The walls are plastered with sketches and watercolours from all of Ghibli's films and the desks are strewn with all the influences and tools the animation masters need - from photos of locations, books and cards from American colleagues at Pixar and a seemingly lifetime supply of paint and pencils.

Moving though, we are presented with complete storyboards for all the Ghibli films for us to flick through. Along the hall way is the rotating exhibition. Until the week before this had been devoted to Pixar, but at the moment has been turned over to UK world-beaters Aardman Animation, creators of Wallce and Gromit and loads of other characters you'd never realise. Aardman's Curse of the Were-Rabbit beat Howl's Moving Castle to the 2006 Oscar. The 2 room exhibition has been put together largely showing off Wallace and Gromit, but with honourable mentions for Creature Comforts, Angry kid and the many adverts and music videos the studio have worked on. Props and models from the films and shorts are on display along with many screens showing interviews and clips. Another staircase leads up to the top floor where a giant Catbus is being clambered over by a large number of Japanese children, their parents relaxing on the sofas provided. Squeezing past this room takes you out onto the roof and a spiral staircase up to the only photo opportunity (inside the museum photos aren't allowed) - a lifesize replica of a Laputian robot. The queue to have your photograph with it leads up the stairs and its at this point when the trouble of being a lone tourist crops up. Finally I have to turn and smile to the family behind me, offering them my camera, I offer up ii desu ka (is it ok?). Thankfully, they are more than happy to help me out and I continue on my way around the roof garden to the next Laputian artefact - a model of the central cube. Heading back into the museum and downstairs to the Saturn Cinema for of the most exciting part of the tour - a screening of one of the many museum-exclusive shorts. These 15 minutes films have never been seen outside of ths building and are an excellent reason for repeat visits (should such a reason be needed). Of course, the films are in Nihongo and have no subtitles, but by and large, they're not needed. The film was entitled Hoshi wo Katta Hi (The day I harvested a star) and the story is about a small boy who lives on a rural farm. This is a universe of technology where the urban areas closely resemble those of Coruscant in the Star Wars films. The rural areas are lacking in most of this technology. Our protagonist is delivering a crop of giant size turnips when his bike breaks down. Wind-in-the-Willows-inspired toad and Rat-like creatures happen to be nearby and, in exchange for a turnip to eat offer the boy a gem. Once planted the gem sprouts a small ball of mineral that floats above the flowerpot it was sown in. Over time, the mineral slowly evolves into a planet. The short was directed by Miyazaki himself and is based on Iblard by Inoue Naohisa.


Finally come the 2 gift shops (one for books and one for o-miyage). I plump for the museum book (a pricey £15, but then when am I ever going to come back?) and plush Totoro. I was interested in some Laputa stuff but all the robot models are very expensive. Indeed, the shop is full of expensive items; from hand drawn cells to a Breitling watch modelled on the one worn by Poroco Rosso and costing cool 525,000Yen (£2.5k). Finally, all that is left to do is head outside to the cafe to grab some food before bidding farewell to the museum. The building is set in parkland and it's a pleasent walk through the park to an earlier station.

On the way back I decide to stop off at Shinjuku - one of the well known districts and grab a look around. The station links a lot of lines and is practically an encased city in it's own right. In fact it's known as the world's busiest station handling 2 million passengers a day. I pick an exit at random and happen to emerge on electic street. A large branch of Bic Camera looms large offering almost every kind of electric gizmo. I continue around the block taking in the large advertising hoardings atop the buildings and eventually arrive back at a completely different entrance to the massive JR station. At Gotanda (the station linking the JR lines to the small private railway my ryokan is based on) I spot a Mos Burger. I've heard a lot of good things about Japanese fast food so I decided to try it out. Fast food is pushing it a bit, because once you order, your food is cooked especially for you and delivered to your table. The quality is so far above the standard of Western fast food that it appears to be a meal that just happens to be in a toasted bun. I plump for a teriyaki burger and it is duly excellent.



Wednesday 24th May
After packing up and presenting the Ryokan owner with a postcard of Durham , I headed for the station to catch the Shinkansen to Tokyo. The Shinkansen are even more amazing than the regular train network. Not only do they also run exactly to time, but the station staff perform amusing little pointing rituals as trains arrive and depart. The trains themselves run every 10 minutes (itself pretty amazing) and have been specifically as an extension to the rail network. As such, they have exclusive lines (a different gauge from the rest of the network) ensuring that they don't get stuck behind slower local trains like the Virgin tilting trains have to put up with. Normally on trains, you always get the impression you aren't travelling very fast when you take a mid-range look outside the window - you have to look at the ground near the train to get a appreciation of speed. On the shinkansen you know ou're travelling fast. The trip from Kyoto to Tokyo takes less than 2 and a half hours and before I know what's happening we're pulling into Tokyo central station (right on time). I set about taking the local lines until it feels like I'm out in the sticks - a tiny little suburb. My Ryokan's map claims a 1 minute walk from the station to the Ryokan and I was doubtful - but no the area is tiny (yet still packs in 3 conbinis, postbox and multiple restaurants). This rokan is set back from the road and is essentially a series of accommodation blocks around a small Japanese garden. I'm shown to my room and just as I decide to head out I hear a rumble. Up until now, the weather has been sweltering...perhaps too sweltering. Or it could just be the nearby trainline. I hold back and utilise my in-room network connection to sort out some details and then the storm starts. Very slowly it moves directly overhead and stays nearby until 10pm. With any hope of exploring gone, I finalise the plans or the next day and go to bed. It's at this point I'm starting to regret opting for the Japanese-style room. After yesterday I've noticed two things: I really like beds and I seem to be losing weight as my jeans are now in dire need of a belt.