Korea

So South Korea is definitely different from Japan... messier, dirtier, louder... the people are less reserved, traffic is crazy, food is.. well, can be really good, but generally less sophisticated. Very high tech though, the various phones/gadgets I see being used on the subway is 2 years ahead of the US.

We did a nice variety of things, from crazy markets and temples, and natural beauty (mountains close to seoul), and we even rented a car to experience korean traffic jams first hand.. good fun.

Did I say markets? For me, one of the craziest things about seoul is the shops here. Think of any specialized item, say, um, toothbrushes, electric plugs, paint, whatever, then imagine a shop 3x3 meters (10x10 feet) jam-packed with just those items... then imagine several dozen stores in the same street right next to eachother mostly identical... it is quite surreal. The prettiest I found one street where tons of small shops sold and produces gears and other other mechanical items... a nice composition of fotos I took from all those shops forthcoming, I'll include a single sample below.

Sushi Binge

We are about to fly to seoul... so here some last pictures from Japan. The most amazing was the fish market in full action... this is the craziest thing I have seen in a while. Entire football fields worth of fishermen and merchents busily selling stuff that has just been caught, and, um, cutting it up and stuff. Then of course eating it fresh after, which has been both some of the best and cheapest fish I have ever had, at the same time. Can't beat that.

Mount fuji was awesome too, sadly a bit foggy so no grand views of the peak, but it made the moon-like landscapes even more surreal.

Kyoto & Nagoya..

Quick update... seen a lot of cool things, see below :)

We probably had the best dinner in a long time yesterday, in this friendly neighbourhood sushi place, where they serve fish killed on the spot for maximum freshness. At one point the chef takes a tied up octopus out of the basin, unties it at which point it starts flapping wildly (it was pretty big, probably 3ft in stretch), chops off one of its tentacles and puts the rest of the octopus back in the basin. The tentacle gets quickly skinned, and then the internal part of the tentacle keeps flopping around as it gets chopped to pieces... pretty crazy to watch. The fish at this place was some of the most amazing I have ever tasted, suprisingly, the most amazing was the shrimp which tasted nothing like any shrimp I have ever tasted before.

The japanese are generally amazingly helpful beyond expectations, but they are not much into randomly socializing with foreigners... not so the people at this sushi place, which went to great lengths to make we got to taste every crazy type of fish/vegetable we had never heard of. Oh, and the sake...

We are off to the architecture museum right now, followed by a seaside drive towards mount fuji..

Kei Fun

We have just arrived in Kyoto! We have been driving the last few days through the countryside, the mountainous areas of Japan are really quite spectacular, and the smaller towns have the more traditional houses.

We've been driving a "Kei Car" which visually is an absolutely miniature car, but inside it is actually rather spacious (more room than my Z). The challenge is more the high center of gravity, the tiny tires and engine (0.6L) which makes these mountain roads more, um, interesting.

Driving on the left was way easier than expected for both of us, its instantly intuitive, and I don't have to focus much at all to be sure to be on the correct side of the road. Which is odd because I normally confuse left & right rather easily. We did get stopped by the police (who giggled at my texas drivers license) for crossing a railroad without stopping first (oops).

We stayed in a traditional ryokan (japanese style hotel), which means sleeping on thin mats on the floor and communal baths.

Doko Maguro...?

We have arrived in Tokyo! From the plane it all looked rather european, some dutch style canals even, but from up close it is all rather different. Even though Tokyo is huge, everything here feels scaled down, and is scaled down (see evidence exhibit A below), they get very creative with using as little space as possible for everything.

First things first, we went to fish market this morning, but little was open as it is apparently a national holiday, but we had some sushi for breakfast anyway.

Though certain things are rather easy (like the subway), there are almost no people here that can speak a full sentence of english, which is a fun adventure, as are the many symbol-only signs. Our pathetic attempts at japanese are greeted with polite smiles.

Tomorrow we will pick up the rental kei-car and venture into the country side...