I THINK I AM IN JAPAN?

To pass the time on subways I've been reading my book, kind of weird to be on a Japanese subway and reading a book about the sarin gass attack on Japanese subways. Even weirder is getting home and on the computer to see that there was a terrorist attack on the London subway system. Here's hoping that doesn't turn everyone working in the airports into a bunch of pricks.

Today I went to Kobe with Yoshihiro. We met at Umeda station as per usual, in the "1st Sound" store. I got there half an hour early so I looked at the CDs. I found a jazz CD by "Kazumi Watanbe" he has some original songs as well as so me song covers, one of which is Jaco Pastroious, so I'll have Alex listen to it when I get back. I also bought the new White Stripes album. Eventually I looked over and saw Yoshihiro, turns out we'd been looking around the store oblivious to each other. I snuck up on him and scared the shit out of him, but it was funny at his expense.

We then took a 20 minute train to a station in Kobe. Kobe is basically the most western city in Japan, and it is. The streets and atmosphere just have a western look to them. From the station we walked uphill for a while then took some steps, and then some more steps. Yoshihiro saw a bee and completely feaked out, I called him on his weird reaction and he told me with all seriousness that if you get stung by a bee three times, you die. I'm not sure if he meant in succession, or as a whole, but I'm just letting you guys know.

We got up to a shrine that afforded us a beautiful view of Kobe. We took some pictures and then looked at the shrine. I enquired about these rather large straw-wrapped cylinders and he said they were rice for making sake, probably in preparation for the Gion Matsuri. We took some rickety stairs even higher and there was an EVEN better outlook which obviously had an EVEN better. We ooed and awwed at the Kobe cityscape and Yoshihiro saw some more bees, so for his sake I said we should head back down. On the way down a huge black butterfly fluttered around our faces, I tried to take a photo but it did that thing where it descends on a flower, then the minute you think you're being sneaky enough to get closer, it flies away, rinse and repeat. Yoshihiro told me it was shy, so I let it be.

To our right was a Holand--ish? Hollish? House, from when there was an embassy in Kobe. All along the streets were Ex-embassies from various nations. We then walked downtown to Motomachi, another covered street full of places to shop. Yoshihiro looked longinly at the cellphone for a while, I can definately tell her wants a new one. From Motomachi China Town begins. Yoshihiro wanted to eat a pig's ear, which I guess he likes a lot, but doesn't eat often. We walked around and it started to springle so I purchased the crappiest umbrella ever.

We found the pig's ears so we went into the little chinese cafe. He got his ear and I got a strawberry milk drink with tapioca at the bottom. Tapioca NOT being pudding, it's a sort of mushy round fruit that actually tastes really good. After that it started completely pouring so we decided to get dinner there and wait it out. We got Shark Fin Soup, which was basically shark fin and noodles. The owner talked our ears off, and was pretty cool. She asked me all kinds of questions about America, and told us about her trip to New York City, and how she missed her layover in Vancouver and had to spend the night in Canada, and all the confusion. Before we left we had the cook take a photo of us with her, and right then it stopped raining, almost on cue.

We left Chinatown and went down to the harbor area. We payed 600 yen (yikes) to take an elevator to the top of Port Kobe Tower. The view was pretty cool, and it had pictures of various Japanese towers and their h eights. Umeda was 182 meters, Kyoto Tower was about 130 meters, and Kobe Tower was about 110 or so.

After the tower we walked around by the water, then made our way to the earthquake memorial park. If you didn't know, in 1994 Kobe experience a massive earthquake, at about 5am. Not sure of the date. Something like 2,000 people died, and it ruined a lot of the city. The city, however, was rebuilt better than ever. The aptly named "Pheonix Park" ilustrated this. A video showed the destruction of Kobe, it was fierce, the huge multi-level highway right next to us was destroyed and torn apart. Next to us a preserved area was left as the earthquake left it, with cracks and rubble everywhere. Yoshihiro told me about his father, and how he experienced a lethal earthquake when he was a child at school. He told me huge cracks were created in the earth, and a few people fell into them.

From the Park we made our way back to Motomachi and China town. Back at China town I got some super sticky sweet rice wrapped in corn husk and Yoshihiro got a big dumpling filled with pork. From there we made our way back to the station, and made our way home.

Also, I was looking at Kobe Beef. A box of I think 4 steaks is roughly 100 dollars. Wondering if it's packed with dry ice if I can ship it home? I'm sure it'd be worth it. Either way I think I'm going to go with AYako some time to a resturaunt, and spend a few hundred dollars on steak.

UPDATE: Pictures can be found here.