Beijing

We arrived in Beijing around 6 or 7am. We had no hostel booked but had met a couple in Kyoto that recommened a place called ‘The Red Lantern’ and decided to make that our destination. After getting breakfast at *coughmcdonaldscough* we were able to use voip on my fone picking up wifi from where else but starbucks Are we in communist China? We took their newly installed Olympic subway system that made NYC’s subway look like China in cleanliness standards. Found our way to the lovely Red Lantern which was beautiful in traditional Chinese decor and hulong style (a central common area with the rooms connected to it). We crashed for a few hours. Luke came down with a similar sickness I had in China and we used Beijing as a resting place for the next couple days to recoup from the hard traveling/partying we had been doing in all of Japan and early China. We met a couple from Canada and Montana that were biking the next day and we tagged along with them. We road around the Forbidden City, Tiennemen Square and the old alley’s of hulongs. We fell into the western traveler scene and ate and went to kareoke with a bunch of others that were staying in our hostel.

We met a French guy, Sabastien, who had slept on The Great Wall and got a few tips from him and planned to do the same. We stocked up at a local hyper-market that made Walmart look like child’s play. With only light sleep sheets and our friend Jack to keep us warm we caught a bus and a mini-van to the Mutianyu section of Wall. We left around 2:30 and got to the top of the wall around 5. It officially closed at 6:30 and we didn’t have permission to sleep there so we snuck down to the side of the wall and hide in the shadows til about 7. After that we felt the coast was clear and made our way back into the old gaurd tower that was to be our home for the nite. Not another single soul did we see our entire time on the wall. After playing some card games, eating our ‘Great Wallnuts’ and reflecting on how this monstrous creation of man was once stationed with gaurds doing the same thing we were, playing games in the nite keeping a lookout for intruders we found a little sleep. It was freezing. The 5 shirts, shorts, pants, jack and thin sleep sheets kept me warm til about 4:30am. Thankfully the sun came up and Luke and I were alone there on the wall to soak in all it’s warmth and beauty. We walked the wall some more in the morning then headed back to Beijing.

Over the next couple days we just walked around. We went to Tienmen Sq where we met this guy we first thought was a tour guide looking for hire but soon found out he was just a friendly slow guy who wanted some friends. He took us to his ‘friends’ restaurant where we got some delicious Beijing duck. Then we went to his apartment where his mother lived with him and he showed us all his toys and fed us pumpkin seeds and grapes. 007 he said his English name was and he wanted to join the U.S. Army and visit America.

We got tickets to Xi’an on another overnite train the next day and said goodbye to another city.

China…

Wowzers! OK so I know it’s been a long minute since I updated but I have good excuse. China blocks wordpress so I couldn’t update. So now here I am in Vietnam and it’s pouring out and I have time to kill so I will try and do a brief update that won’t come close to doing justice to the amazing times we had in China.

Shiminoseki, Japan – Qingdao, China

We caught our 5am train to Shiminoseki and found our way to the ferry terminal and boarded our glorious old boat to take us to a new far-off land, China. Our boat was once majestic in her day I’m sure. Now she was left as a cheap passenger boat and used mostly for cargo. Our boat was ‘The Shining’ hotel on water. It had a grand ballroom with seating for 300+ equipped with a large screen that projected a movie and later turned into our kareoke bar. Ghostly card-rooms, lounges and cafeterias were left in original form but with only about 120 passengers on board they were unused. We made friends with this old Japanese master who we sang kareoke with into the wee hours then got into a dirty chesnut and liquor party with him and another passenger. The next day we bathed in their huge sento, which is a giant hottub for relaxing in after you shower. After we prepared for our departure which came all too soon with the fun we were having onboard. We met an older Japanese couple who vacation often in Qingdao and were invited to come and stay with him when we return to Japan. He also gave us some money because it was Sunday and the banks were closed and we had no money for a taxi.

We were hurried off the boat and through customs without a hitch. Outside we were swarmed with anxious taxi drivers looking to make a buck. Our ride to our hostel was quite an awakening to the differences between Japan and China. The streets litered with garbage, buildings falling in disrepair and traffic insanely chaotic were the first things that made us aware we were no longer in Japan. Checked into our hostel and went out for a bite to eat. We got tickets to Beijing from Qingdao with the help of some students who were in Qingdao looking for jobs and spoke a little English. We took them out to eat for helping us and they showed us around the city a bit. The next day before we caught our train we were called over by some locals to drink with them and they were getting into it pretty deep! We drank Tsing Tsao beers and beers from the keg they put into plastic bags and poured into mugs. After they made us pound 4 or 5 of those 22’s in about 30 mins they then wanted to take us to kareoke. We had about 2 hours before we had to catch our train and decided we had enough time and joined them.

At kareoke they had two of the girls working there be Luke and my escort where they poured our drinks, fed us food and danced with us. Time went by fast and we had about 30mins to get to our train. None of the people we were with spoke any English so I showed them my ticket and they motioned we had to go, quickly. We hugged and said our goodbyes and they paid for everything, then we went out to catch a cab with the help of one of our new friends. We weren’t having any luck so she flagged down a police officer and she showed them our ticket and map to our hostel (we still had to grab our bags). The officer sitting in the passenger seat jumped out and ran down the street to the hospital 100m away and spoke to a taxi driver who currently had customers that were assisting an elderly man out of his back seat. He agreed to take us and we jumped in and sped off. He missed our road and I pointed on the map again but he couldn’t see the fine print and took us to the wrong hostel. Luke and I were lost the nite before and stumbled upon this hostel and a back way home down stairs and through back streets so we paid our cab and took off running. I took a fall down the stairs and cut up my hand good but we rushed to the hostel grabbed our bags and ran out to the street. We flagged down a vehicle, which wasn’t a taxi and showed them our ticket and he sped off towards to the train station. We paid our civilian taxi driver and ran to the train. There were no lines and no one boarding the train which is unusual in China, but we soon realized everyone was boarded. We caught our train and as soon as we found our bunks (it was a hard-sleeper we booked) the train pulled away from the station. What an amazing welcoming to China!

Hiroshima last nite…

Wow. Hiroshima has been such an amazing city to us. We had such an amazing nite with our skater friends we didn’t know how we could top it. After a great nite in the internet cafe of free ice cream, chatting with friends back home and updating the blog, Luke and I got a late start. We found this amazing restaurant/cafe for brunch that was equivalent to Dean and Deluca’s. We sat and people watched prob for a good hour there after and then decided to walk some. I was drawn back to our usual park and for good reason. As we walked to the water we were greeted by an English speaking Zimbabwae ex-pat. He asked us about our travels and then we talked for a good 2.5-3 hours with him about everything from Japanese sub-culture, politics, economics, war, business… He was a genius. It was so refreshing and a good reminder of why I came on this trip. After this amazing discussion Luke and I were both exhausted and just sat by the water and reflected. We went and grabbed some cheap noodles and people watched some more. We headed back to our usual park where another baseball game was taking place. Luke and I did some catching up on the years we missed together in-between college listening to the roaring baseball fans behind us. We stayed again at our new found home, the internet cafe, where we got into some ping-pong…deep!

The following day we got an even later start and paid for it too, literally, as the cafes are hourly. We wanted to go back to the cafe from the day before but missed their breakfast special and couldn’t afford the lunch. We wandered around the streets some to find something. Luke’s eye was drawn to this dirty little shop and we boldly went for it. With no English menu or pictures to point to we just randomly pointed on the menu at two items and crossed our fingers for what we’d get. We both lucked out with huge bowls of delicious ramen and were quite pleased with our little manga/ramen shop we stumbled into.

We had a ferry to catch the next day in Shimonoseki 4 hours away so we headed to the train station to sort out our morning plans. No trams or buses ran at the early hour we needed to get to the station so we weighed our options. We found an Internet cafe near the train but neither of us felt at home compared to our other diggs so we walked around the city more. After many stops and taking our time we ended up back in our usual area of Hiroshima and I again felt compelled to return to our park. To our disappointement there are no baseball game and there were some skaters but we didn’t see our friends. Turns out it was our friends and they came over and talked with us some more. Luke and I got a little crazy and and after our friends left us to go clubbing we decided to explore…

There was a ‘Family pool’ (community pool) near by that a few days early we were hoping to cool off in but found it closed for the season. This nite however we decided it was re-opened and hopped a fence and took a gander. It was a large snaking, circular pool that soon became our subject for a foto shoot. The cool dark murky water was calling my name but following better judgement I resisted. Luke and I discussed sleeping there for the night and I even hopped the fence and brought all our bags over! As the nite went on tho we came to our senses and longed for the comforts of our internet cafe. I had a child-like curiousity and began to explore the buildings of the pool. As we were ready to leave we heard an alarm from inside the buildings that we must’ve triggered from a motion sensor. We went into panic mode and ran across the pool yard and hopped the fence 4 times as fast as we came over. Safety. Oh I forgot to mention the pyramid scultpture we climbed too (hopefully in pictures to come).

After a safe escape we casually meandered down the street and visited a sculpture outside the castle there in Hiroshima. We headed back to homebase (the internet cafe) for a good 2 hours of sleep before getting up at 5am to catch our 4 hour train to Shimonseki.

Thank you Hiroshima for an amazing visit!

Kyoto, Osaka, Hiroshima…

Wow, so many stories where do i begin?! I guess chronilogically would be a good place. So we arrived in Kyoto to rainy typhoon weather. We got a hostel and crashed for a good nap. When I awoke I met some of our roommates, a British couple doing a 1-year world trip. They were super friendly and gave us their lonely planet guide to china and great advice on some places to go. We talked over hot sake served by our hostel, perfect for the rainy weather. The next day Luke and I went to a temple, I’m blanking on the name, but it was tourist city. We walked around Gion the geisha district of Kyoto and were exhausted.

We caught a 35min train ride to Osaka to meet up with Hiro’s friend Mina. She took us to an amazing Jazz bar in Osaka that was too good to leave. We ended up spending 4 or 5 hours there then went to an Izakaya for a late nite snack. The next day Mina helped us get our overnite bus tickets to Hiroshima and we went our to another izakaya and then back to the Jazz Bar for one last visit. Luke and I said our goodbyes and was guided by our ‘lucky goat’ to find the right bus terminal (an elderly lady walked prob 15mins out of her way to help us for no reason other than she saw us looking at a map! I love Japanese people.) We took the overnite bus, 7 hours, from Osaka to Hiroshima and arrived at 7am this morning.

This has got to have been one of the best days of the trip (so many good ones to choose from tho..) We needed to make it to a travel agency to book our tickets to China and after a few misdirections and side trekking we got there. As usual we were greeted with friendly smiles and helped to no end knowing none of the language. After we got our tickets we went for some food and stumbled into this amazingly delicious restaurant for lunch. I asked our waitress if she knew of an internet cafe because that was our plan for where we were going to sleep. Through map pointing, a translation book and assistances from the chef we were giving a direction to go. We found it and planned to come back later. We decided to go see some of the many sites Hiroshima had to offer. We found a great little park and hung out with a bunch of eager baseball fans behind Hiroshima’s professional league stadium waiting for the game to start. Cute kids running around, saying hi to us scary white folk, tossing a baseball back and forth and just relaxing. After a bit we went over to see the A-bomb dome and ran into a 50 year old lady who was learning English and wanted to practice it by giving free tours of the historic sites. We grabbed a quick bite to eat and both felt compelled to head back to the little park to hang out and listen to the baseball game. When we got back the park had cleared out cause the fans went into the game. There was a group of skateboarders hanging out in the park and as Luke and I started to drift off they inched over and started a very broken conversation. We spent the rest of the nite hanging out with them watching them skate, drinking and took an amazing train ride. They left us and we sat at the park a bit longer. We heard some noise coming from the trees behind us so we moved to see and there was a group of BMX riders just riding around and they were amazing. We watched them for a bit then decided to see some of the historic sites at nite. Violinists, guitarists, singers and dancers could be seen and heard as we walked along the water front, just performing for fun. After his montrous 37+ hours on very little sleep we headed back to the internet cafe where we are staying. I’m writing this now as i sit in a leatheｒ massage chair in my own private booth all sleepy eyed and eager to see what tomorrow will bring…

Goodbye Tokyo…

It was a sad day but it had to come. We had to say goodbye to all our good friends we made in Tokyo. They sent us out with a blast! Kareoke for hours and then a wild liquour and cheeseburger party (actually it was ramen and sake but had to throw in that trailer park boys ref cause luke and I can’t stop using it). We caught the train back in the morning and slept all day. Then we met up with Hiro and went for our last meal in Tokyo.

Michi and Hiro took us to the bus stop and we parted ways This turned out to be a bus ride from hell for me. I had horrible gut rot and there was no toilet on the bus. It was an over-nite bus and I was planning in getting a good 6-7 hours of sleep, instead I was naseuated the whole trip. We got in to Kyoto at 6am with no place to go. Luke and I were both exhausted and wanted to find a secluded spot to sleep. This was more daunting then we thought. All the parks were temples so no sleeping there. We ended up renting out a kareoke room to get a good hour of sleep. Then we tried to kill our time until we could get into our hostel at 4pm. It was downpouring most of the day from a tsunami that was coming from china I guess. This was a rude awakening from our lavish tokyo lifestyle and a hint of some of the challenges this trip will bring. As soon as we checked in I crashed for a few hours of much needed rest.

Another Crazy Tokyo Nite…

Man, this is quite a trip already. Luke and I have been just wandering around Tokyo at random seeing temples, parks, shops, etc. Yesterday we met up with our Korean friend, In-Suk, and wandered around Tokyo together. It was fun/difficult trying to communicate with her since her English wasn’t very good. We wandered around Roppongi, which is a ritzy area, and then headed to Harajuku where Hiro’s studio is. We stopped along the way and got a huge meal and then headed to Hiro’s studio. He wasn’t there so we went to a karaoke bar for a bit and then went American style and got drinks and headed to the park. It was around 12 and the trains stop then and start back up around 5. We decided to stay out all nite and hang out in the park. We met these 3 Japanese guys playing guitar and singing and we just sat down and joined them. What an amazing time just chilling in the park listening to some music with random strangers dancing, singing and making small broken-english conversation.

Oh and I got some fotos up for you all so enjoy!

Japan!

Wow. Words can’t describe how amazing the first 5 days have been. We arrived in Tokyo safely and met up with Hiro. He took us to his studio and his friend, Jhon Nam, was giving Japanese lessons to a group of Korean friends. Jhon Nam was having everyone come out to her fathers ‘get-away’ house in Nagano for the weekend and we were invited too.

It was amazing! The house was gorgeous. Beverly Hills meets Adirondaks. There was an outdoor onsen (hotub), 6+ hour Korean BBQ of non-stop eating and drinking, kareoke, soba noodles on traditional tattami matte seating, visited a castle… So many good memories and friends and it hasn’t even been a week!

the great adventure

On Sept. 10th I embark on a great journey. I plan to travel, with my high school friend Lucas Warren, for half a year to Japan, China and Southeast Asia. This trip came about coincidentally as Luke and I talked while working our 9-5 office jobs, he in Boston and me in New York. We both had a desire to get out of the office and travel the world. Over the next few months we slowly chiseled out a game plan and settled on a time frame. After a few needed delays we finally threw in the chips and bought 1-way tickets to Japan. Our plan is to start in Tokyo and then head south to Shimonoseki where we will catch a 2-day ferry to Qinhuangdao, China. From there we will most likely go to Beijing and make our way south. I say most likely because we have no set plans after we arrive in China. We have a rough idea of desitnations we’d like to hit and we plan on doing some volunteering in southern China. We will then go to Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand. This will be the longest journey either of us has ventured on but definitely not our last. I will try to update as much as I can along the way, no promises though I know how I am.