Get me the hell off this rock.

Seriously man what a month. There have been more ups and downs for me than Nemesis in Alton towers. Between beamtime experiments, most of which didn’t go too well, the Cheiron School and the passing of my Grandma, I’ve been totally physically and emotionally exhausted. I’ve also not had a free weekend in a month so the past one was a very welcome break.

In the past half a year that I’ve been here the 4000 miles between me and home have never felt as far as last week. At times I just wanted to curl up and sleep but I had to keep going.

The external pressures of work were definitely reaching into my psyche and when colleagues started to say things like “Is that enough for you?”  and, “You know I’ve noticed you don’t take much food.”, I realized it was time for a break to get my head screwed back on. Old habits die hard I guess.

Anyway before shooting on to the weekend I’ll backtrack to Thursday. My experiments with Josie last week did not go so well. I couldn’t take any readings as the DIT just wouldn’t work and being a team of two people we just ended up exhausted without achieving much.

So on Thursday Hikima-san, my colleague on this project, and myself headed to the local Izakaya Shunsai to commiserate our shortcomings. Exchanging an “otsukare sama” and a “kanpai” over a Kirin free and some food was a nice way to wind down and get to know Hikima-san a bit. We had a lovely chat over some food, the mochi bacon was definitely worth a mention. I learned a bit more about Hikima-san’s background and interests, in particular how he found moving to Kansai from Kanto and his fondness of home brewed beer something that is not so common in Japan.

Right so for the weekend I was determined to escape from the mountain. Arnaud was headed for Osaka to take a flight to Spain to attend an international conference so I asked if I could tag along. We were first going to a Mexican restaurant in Shinsaibashi for lunch with a friend of Arnaud’s before mooching about in Namba for a while.

At Shinsaibashi we met Arnaud’s friend, Mai, before ascending one of the nearby buildings for food. Japan never ceases to amaze me for its careful use of space. The building was pretty thin but each floor had it’s own tiny but fully functional restaurant.. They really know how to pack stuff in here.

The place was suitably Mexican with plenty of bright reds, oranges and yellows, tinkling acoustic guitars and interestingly writing all over the walls. Apparently some guy called Gen had been at our table two years previously. The place also seemed to be popular with the non-native contingent of Osaka. I picked Up American, Australian, British and Irish accents during our time there.

The food was nice, tortillas and beans make a nice change from rice, and also something with a bit of spice was very welcome. I was very glad Arnaud had invited me along, I don’t think I would of ever come across this place otherwise and I do love Mexican food.

So well fed and the conversations were rolling. Well sort of. I made an effort to speak as much Japanese as possible but my vocabulary is still frustratingly lacking. I can understand a lot but when it comes to expressing myself I always come up short. Admittedly Mai’s English was excellent but that's not the point really.

I’d voiced this to Arnaud before but what he said is right, I just need to practice more. I guess I make a lot of excuses, I’m too busy, I work with all Koreans, but they are just that. If I really wanted to I could speak better, I just need to practice more and ask more questions. I look stupider sitting there like a lemon than asking how to say something.

After killing about 3 hours in the restaurant, Arnaud was hesitant to leave due to his rather heavy luggage, we spent the rest of the time wandering through Namba and laughing at quirky shop names. I also had my first introduction to “プリクラ” (puri kura) short for purinto kurabu.

This is a phenomenon that whilst originating in the 90’s has managed to persevere in Japan, particularily amongst tweenaged girls. The premise is simple, insert your money and get your pictures taken. However the camera tweaks your looks subtly; emphasizing eyes, skin tone, mouth e.t.c. You can then add objects backgrounds and messages before finally printing the images as stickers. It made a nice souvenir at any rate.

At 6 o’clock we departed, bon chance pour la presentation Arnaud, and I headed to J-hoppers to spend the night. I’m just going to give this place a shameless plug now. It’s a hostel very close to Umeda station that I frequently visit. So much so that the staf recognize me by name and sight.

It really is a nice place. The staff are good fun and very helpful, the rooms and facilities are always clean, the location is great and best of all, it’s cheap. Right so enough advertising I settled myself in with some dinner and started watching the TV. It wasn’t long before I was joined by a couple of Japanese guests who wanted to change the channel. They put on a show called “Ippon Grand Prix.” I really didn’t understand too much but I think it was sort of like ‘whose line is it anyway’. They found it hilarious at any rate.

I moved upstairs eventually, tiring of the fact I couldn’t get any of the jokes and started chatting with a guy from Vancouver called Rob. Another reason I love staying in Hostels is you meet such interesting people. Rob is a freelance animator and had come to Japan, in his own words, because hey he’d never been to Japan, as good a reason as any I guess.

He was actually particularly interested in the art and had been picking out art books from second hand stores. He had a sketchbook to document his travels and kindly let me have a look. I’m always envious of people who can draw, it’s a skill I just don’t have. I guess words are just my means of expression. I had a good natter anyway before finally going to bed for a Good nights sleep.

At least that was the plan. Alas not to be. Unfortunately the guy sharing my room was a bit of a pleb. He strolled in at 4am bladdered, tried to hold a conversation for about 20 minutes before passing out and snoring the hostel down. I kid you not Nori, the manager, told me she could here him on the 2nd floor when she was cleaning, impressive since we were on the 4^th.

Still ever the philosopher, it was a disguised blessing as it gave me the opportunity to have more time exploring. I didn’t have much of a plan but thankfully due to the rain on Saturday a festival in Kyoto I had wanted to see was postponed until Sunday.

Since I was arriving so early, the festival began at 12, I decided to walk to th imperial palace from the station. Whilst it didn’t look so far on the map, never trust Japanese maps, it was actually an hour and a half walk. Still it gave me a fair opportunity to check out downtown Kyoto. It has such a nice vibe, totally different to the world of crazy that is Osaka and it was nice to experience a bit more.

On my way up I dropped by the Higashi Honganji temple. Honganji means primal, original or true vow depending on how you want to translate it, and it is the largest sect of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism in Japan. The complex itself is massive and the front gate, called the Mie-do, is in contention for being one of the largest wooden buildings in the world, it was quite impressive.

The main event began at the gates of the Imperial palace. The Jidai matsuri (festival of the ages) is a huge parade, which commemorates the end of Kyoto’s status as the capital of Japan in the 1800s. It consists of a parade of roughly 2000 people dressed in traditional costumes representing different periods of the cities history. It’s an awe-inspiring sight, especially given that many of the costumes are particularly intricate.

 I arrived to see huge crowds of people lining the streets leading from the palace to the Heian Jingu where the parade concludes. I was supposed to be meeting an acquaintance however she was yet to arrive in Kyoto so I decided to head towards the gates. The parade began dead on 12 o’clock with a group of men dressed as soldiers from the mid Meji period playing various instruments. The parade then takes us back in time from the 1800s back to the 700s when Kyoto was established as the capital.

It was an amazing a different way to get a view of Japanese history.  A bit more engaging than a museum or gallery for sure however as the announcements were all in Japanese I feel I didn't get as much out of it as I could of. Still I did finally get to see Geisha and Maiko, something I still hadn’t achieved since my parents visit.

I didn’t manage to meet my friend as planned, sadly the crowds were a bit intense, but instead met someone new. I noticed a young lady struggling to see over the crowds and let her go in front of me. Whilst I’m not tall back home I do have a good few inches on the average Japanese person and it’s great for situations like this.

We got chatting and I ended up spending the rest of the day with her. She was out in Kyoto for a year studying Japanese language and had been here about six weeks. It was nice to someone who was fresh in the country as I keep finding myself sounding a bit jaded and hearing someone’s fresh enthusiasm really helps bring the amazement back.

I love meeting new people, everyone’s got a story, and I also love a good gab so I was very happy she chose to stick around with me for the whole event. To my delight she was from England and from the North, a double whammy of nostalgia. It was nice to chat with someone from the UK it’d been quite a while.

The hours passed very fluidly, I was lucky to find someone as gabby as myself and with such different motivations and reasons for being in Japan from the norm. It was a fantastic day and as always nice to chat freely with someone my own age. It’s also inspired me once more to study the language a bit harder. I’ll get there in the end, “できるやんか“。しゃしんをみて、たのしんでください。

Mata kondo ne.