Links to other Japan pages  Tokyo  Hiroshima  Jayne

This is where it all got a little weird. This was supposed to be the easy bit, tagged onto the end of the trip. My friend Michele, one of the infamous tequila throwing Harris sisters from Leiden, was working in Kyoto, teaching English for the British Council. She was due to leave at the end of July, and as I was in the neighbourhood, relatively speaking, I was going to spend a week with her, making the most of the free accommodation.

I got more than I bargained for.

I left the sweltering heat of Bangkok early in the morning and seemed to spend the whole day traveling, arriving at Osaka airport in late afternoon. The taxi man was waiting for me, legendary Japanese efficiency and less legendary Harris efficiency combining effectively. It was a shared taxi, so I had to wait for the other passengers, which gave me time to wander around the airport shops and compare prices.

A beer vending machine. Unfortunately it closes at 11pm.

A high-tech Japanese toilet.

These were as bad as I'd feared, and I quickly resolved to stop translating them into a currency I was familiar with, and pretend it was monopoly money instead.

While I found it depressingly easy to empty my wallet, it was significantly harder to fill it again. The Japanese aren't big on international cash machines, or credit cards. Otherwise my expectations were met or exceeded. Mostly.

I never found one of the infamous vending machines selling schoolgirls knickers, but there were plenty of other machines, for almost everything. My favourite was the beer machine (left). Shame about the curfew, though. Gadgets were everywhere - even a humble toilet had lots more knobs and buttons than could possibly be useful. The one on the right belongs to Michele and Karen's flat, and as I was under the impression that they had a squat toilet, it was much appreciated.

Michele has always been a bit of a party animal, and she made a special effort because I was there. But first we went temple spotting. We met up with Michele's friend Jayne, of whom more later. The three of us wandered around the center of Kyoto for a few hours, avoiding the hordes of uniformed school children, eventually taking in a temple or so, but around closing time, so we didn't spend too much time in them.

The tori (gate) to the Yasaka-Jinja shrine at Maruyama Park.

After all the temples had closed we made for the pub, but got there too before it opened and had to go to Starbucks instead. To while away the time it takes to drink a tall coffee, we watched a Japanese girl applying her make up and trying to curl her eyelashes with some kind of torture implement.

Outside the Yasaka-Jinja shrine.

Japanese teenage girls are like something out of a cartoon - 6 inch platform shoes, short skirts, optional leggings, padded bras (I'm told - I didn't investigate myself), bleached and coloured hair. And loads and loads of make up.

So we had a couple of beers, and then met up with Karen, Jeremy and Tim, some more of Michele's friends in the A Bar, where we had to queue for a little while before being seated at a big table with about ten other people on it.

A wishing tree - bad fortunes are left here to bring good luck.

This was my first introduction to the Japanese at drink. There were a couple of people nearly asleep around the table, after just a couple of beers. One girl arrived after we did, had one beer and went bright red - not just her face, but even her legs. Jayne tried to teach them to drink shooters - small glasses of beer in this case, which you picked up in your mouth. They never really got the hang of it, but the girl with the red legs in particular was keen to try. Of course Jayne got pretty pissed as well.

CK Cafe's strange admission prices.

We left the restaurant and headed for the CK Cafe. On the way Jayne started singing Michele and Karen's address, to try and help remember it. Somehow Jayne managed to pick up an off-her-face Japanese girl (maybe it was the other way round, but this seems most likely). They tried to dance in step to the club while still singing the address. We got to the club, and Michele insisted that Jayne stay at the back so that she didn't abuse the doorman, then proceeded to abuse the doorman herself. Fortunately someone turned up with some tickets (right), so we all got in cheap.

Inside they were playing cheesy music in the main hall and dogs bollocks techno in the small one. Needless to say the main hall was picked, mostly with over made up girls wobbling on their heels and western men trying to pull, while the small hall was nearly empty.

Karen, Michele and Jayne in Cafe Zinho.

I liked Jayne anyway, but two things sealed it for me. First she stripped down to her bra to dance - not an unusual occurrence I was told. Then in the main hall some Japanese girls (blonde hair, too much make up wobbly heels, blah blah blah), were dancing on the speakers. On the ones nearest the bar were two girls. There was probably room for a third, so Jayne decided she was going to freak them out by dancing in the middle. The girls on the speakers would only dance to songs they knew, the rest of the time they would just stand there looking lost. Jayne would and did dance to everything. They got pissed off with this and one of them nudged Jayne. Jayne retaliated by pushing her. The girl lost her balance and went flying, somehow executing a perfect landing on the floor. Her face was a picture.

The dodgy girl Jayne had acquired was still hanging around, so Jeremy did his good Samaritan bit and tried to get her in a taxi. We all did likewise, heading back to Michele's to sleep or more likely pass out. Or in Jayne and my case to talk until dawn and then beyond.

The Leaping Tiger Garden at the Nanzen-Ji Temple .

Kyoto is replete with temples, but Michele and I picked a really miserable Monday to go and look at them. The gravel garden (left) is about as good as it got.

Michele, Karen, Maki and Jayne at an Indian restaurant.

We met up that evening for a couple of beers and then a meal at an Indian restaurant. After the culinary riches of South East Asia, Japan was quite disappointing. This restaurant was probably on a par with those in Zürich, which means OK, but not great. The company on the other hand was excellent. Jayne had dyed her hair red since the last time I saw her, but otherwise was as bubbly and friendly as she had been on Saturday. After a few more beers in an English pub, Maki headed home and the rest of us went back to Michele and Karen's.

Michele's spare bed was the downstairs sofa, folded out to make it flat. This was more than adequate for one person, but with two it was more than a little cosy. Just as well we liked each other. In spite of this I wasn't in any hurry to get up, a situation exacerbated by us not going to bed properly before it had started getting light. But, later rather than sooner, I was ready for a couple of days in Tokyo.

I arrived back in Kyoto in the early evening. I met up with Jayne and Michele and Karen in Cafe Zinho for a couple of quiet beers. We headed home via another bar, which was empty and which Michele and Karen could never recall having seen anyone in. It was here that I learnt my only Japanese phrase: "icky icky icky icky", to be recited to the tune of "down in one, down in one...". After this little bit of excitement we all headed back to Michele's.

Another late start, but I still managed a day trip to Hiroshima and then it was time to Party in Kyoto. Traditionally this begins in the Hub, so that's where I met Jayne, Michele, Karen and a load of their friends. Jayne had been shopping and seemed to have bought the entire Hello Kitty range, which she gave to me. What a Sweetie!

After the Hub closed we moved on to a karaoke night. The karaokes I'd been to in Europe had usually been in a pub or club, with a stage and an audience. In Kyoto, we went to a Karaoke brothel where we hired a room by the hour. There were 10 or so of us, and we all took turns choosing the songs to be played and singing along to them. Fortunately there were copious amount of whiskey flowing, so what must have been an appalling din didn't sound so bad.

We did this for two or three hours, before deciding it was time to crash for the night. Jayne and I got a taxi back to Michele's leaving her with some of her friends.

My last day in Kyoto, and time to say goodbye to Jayne (oops - gratuitous and unintentional Slade reference).

Links to other Japan pages  Tokyo  Hiroshima  Jayne

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Last modified on 22nd December 2007 3:31 PM EST

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