The Plastic Mancunian: Japan

Showing posts with label Japan. Show all posts

Monday, 10 July 2017

700 Posts and More Travel Snippets

Well, folks, it’s another milestone for The Plastic Mancunian – this is my 700^th post. This means that I have written 700 posts of utter drivel, averaging about 900 words per post making a rough total of 630,000 words of nonsense to bore anybody who happens to stumble on this web site whilst presumably looking for something more important and interesting.

In fact, the 10th anniversary of The Plastic Mancunian is 21^st March 2018 – and I think that might be a fitting point to call it a day. I haven’t fully decided this yet but it seems a good place to stop and put my energies into writing something more worthwhile – watch this space.

However, that is about 8 months away and until then I shall continue to bore you with drivel.

I rarely use Facebook these days, but one of the main applications I use is something from Tripadvisor that allows me to record where I have travelled. Thus far, it tells me that I have been to 34 countries, including 368 cities. By “cities” the application really means cities, towns and villages; but I’m not complaining. It also tells me that I have travelled 294,688 miles and seen 25% of the world.

I aim to increase all of these statistics before I say hello to God in person.

Here is a map of my travels:

I thought I’d would repeat a similar post I wrote way back in 2010 (you can read it here) and share a few more snippets of fun that I have experienced from my travels from 2010 to the present day:

(1) Muscat, Oman – I had a rather strange but very tasty dish: Camel Biriyani.

(2) British Columbia, Canada – I stood on a glacier in the snow drinking whiskey. I hate whiskey but it was required to warm myself up.

(3) Reykjavic, Iceland – I found myself on a dance floor in an Icelandic night club surrounded by five gorgeous, tall blond women. Mrs PM said that I looked terrified.

(4) Boston, USA – I met Henry VIII on a street – promoting Virgin flights to the UK. He didn’t think I was English and asked if I wanted the trip of a lifetime – back to England.

(5) Cape Cod, USA – We stayed with a wonderful old couple in Cape Cod who referred to us as “the kids”, not really realising that I was 48 at the time.

(6) Salvador, Brazil – The only way I could communicate with a lot of Brazilians was using very bad Spanish in the vague hope that they would also speak it as a second language. It worked – once or twice.

(7) British Columbia, Canada – the scenery in this wonderful part of the world is amongst the most breath-taking I have ever seen.

(8) Seattle, USA – Mrs PM’s dad was asked for ID when ordering a beer. He was 68 years old at the time.

(9) Muscat, Oman – the hottest temperature I have ever experienced is 46°C. I thought I was going to melt.

(10) Hakone, Japan – I used an onsen for the first time. It was like taking a hot bath.

(11) Barcelona, Spain – Barcelona is home to one of the greatest football teams in Europe, if not the world. And I managed to find a bar showing my own beloved team’s game. They are Walsall and are in the third tier of the English football league.

(12) Santorini, Greece – I climbed a volcano in beach sandals.

(13) Berlin, Germany – I walked into a restricted area outside the Reichstag, reserved only for German politicians and staff. A stern but friendly German police officer showed me the correct way to go.

(14) Muscat, Oman – I refused to carry on a training course until my students agreed to form the Omani division of the Walsall Football Supporters Club. They agreed but wondered why I don’t support a good team like Manchester United or Manchester City.

(15) Alaska, USA – Alaska is the only place I have ever seen blue ice floating in a freezing cold sea.

(16) Blue Lagoon, Iceland – Heaven is sitting in a geothermal spa with a silica mud mask drinking a glass of beer.

(17) Boston, USA – I informed a group of American tourists on a famous boat used in the War for Independence that they were lucky to have won and that one day we’ll be back. They took it in jest rather than lynching me – I guess Americans do understand British humour after all.

(18) Tokyo, Japan – The Robot Restaurant is the craziest and entertaining show I have ever been to.

(19) Bύzios, Brazil – Mrs PM and I saw a model phot shoot at our hotel whilst relaxing by a pool. I did not stare at them and I certainly didn’t take any photos myself (well not many anyway).

(20) Alaska, USA – I was introduced to log rolling, where two men run on a log in water until one of them plunges into the icy water. Great fun to watch but not much fun if you lose.

(21) Reykjavic, Iceland – I ate whale for the first and only time. Not a whole one!!

(22) Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates – The only mosque I have ever visited is the Sheikh Zayed Mosqu in Abu Dhabi. It is huge and beautiful and can accommodate 40,000 worshippers.

(23) Kunming, China – I was asked, as guest of honour, to select the fish we would be having for dinner. The poor thing was swimming with his friends and ended up on our plate. I was sad about this particularly at the end when the tank was missing one resident.

(24) Lisbon, Portugal – Lisbon has a smaller version of the famous Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro.

(25) Hakone, Japan – We stayed in a Japanese-style hotel and wore a yukata for mealtimes.

(26) Monaco – I have never seen so many supercars in one place at any one time.

(27) Rome, Italy – I celebrated my 50^th birthday in Rome with friends, one of whom , another Dave, was also 50. We were forced to wear a “50 Today” badge while the women in the group wore a T shirt with a picture of the two of us enclosed in a heart with the slogan “Happy 50^th Birthday You Old Gits!”

(28) Berlin, Germany – We actually ate a Berliner, which contrary to a popular ex-American president, is a doughnut (a Berliner Pfannkuchen in fact).

(29) Tokyo, Japan – Mrs PM and I got lost in Shinjuku railway, not once but three times. The third time, a member of staff who tried to help us was also clueless.

(30) Boston, USA – I had a beer in Cheers.

(31) Nice, France – Nice is my favourite city in France and I will not let the antics of a nutcase in a lorry stop me from going back.

(32) Puerto Banús, Spain – I strolled down a crowded street walking between a cruising Ferrari and a cruising Lamborghini. Bloody show offs!

(33) Dubai, United Arab Emirates - In order to conquer my fear of heights I climbed the Burl Khalifa in Dubai – the tallest building in the world at 828 metres. My quest failed. I am still scared of heights .

(34) Tokyo, Japan – This city is absolutely huge. Having spent three days there I only saw about a quarter of the place.

(35) British Columbia, Canada – I met a Mountie, a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

(36) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – We strolled along Ipanema Beach whilst drinking a coconut and shortly afterwards on Copacabana Beach while drinking beer. Beautiful.

(37) Marbella, Spain – Keen to show off my blossoming Spanish skills I ordered a beer and ended up with shandy!

(38) Kyoto, Japan – Two very drunk businessmen starting talking to us in a sushi bar and tried to persuade in very broken English to join them on a bar crawl. Thankfully we had a bullet train to catch.

(39) Kunming, China – I ate some of the most wonderful yet weird food I have had. I avoided insects.

(40) Beijing, China – I ate some of the most wonderful yet weird food I have ever had – again! I avoided pig brain.

(41) Dubai, United Arab Emirates – You can buy gold bars from a vending machine. I didn’t because I am skint.

(42) Alaska, USA – There is a photograph of me about to put a dollar bill in the cleavage of a very buxom waitress. And Mrs PM’s dad was doing exactly the same. Don’t worry - everybody was doing it; we were in a themed restaurant/bar pretending to be a whorehouse and it was a bit of fun. The photo was taken by his wife.

(43) Tokyo, Japan – I used the world’s best toilet in Tokyo. I’m glad I work in IT so I could work out how to operate it.

(44) Berlin, Germany – We were in Berlin for the 25^th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall but missed the celebrations by two days.

(45) Kunming, China – I saw the world’s worst toilet on a building site in Kunming. I am delighted that I didn’t have to use it.

(46) Iguaçu Falls, Brazil and Argentina – I visited something more impressive than Niagara Falls, namely Iguaçu Falls. We were so impressed that we saw them in Brazil one day and just over the border in Argentina the next day.

(47) Barcelona, Spain – La Sagrada Familia, the famous cathedral in Barcelona, is still not complete 135 years after it was started. It will finally be finished in 2026.

(48) Kyoto, Japan – We visited a shrine with around 10,000 sacred gates (torii). An amazing sight.

(49) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - In order to conquer my fear of heights I climbed Mount Corcovado in Rio de Janeiro to see the legendary statue of Christ the Redeemer. My quest failed. I am still scared of heights

(50) Hong Kong – After visiting for the umpteenth time in 2013, I can safely say that it is still my favourite city in the world. Mrs PM and I hope to go again in 2018 for our 20^th anniversary.

That's it for now. If I have made you laugh or held you interest for a minute or two then that’s great.

See you for post 701 and once again thank you so much for bothering to read the nonsense I write.

Friday, 26 June 2015

The Robot Restaurant

I still have no idea what the show was about, even two years after the event. I’ve had a long time to think about it, to ponder the plot twists, to decipher the amazing music and to try to make any sense of the weird spectacle that was presented to us on the night of 7th May 2013 in Tokyo – but the truth is I can’t.

Mrs PM and I were wondering where to eat that evening and she spotted something on Tripadvisor; the Robot Restaurant in Shinjuku, Tokyo.

It was relatively near to our hotel and it seemed like a good idea. We found it after a short search. It was easy to spot because there was a robot standing outside.

Mrs PM meets her first robot of the evening

I was slightly sceptical at this point but I stuck with it and before we knew, we found ourselves in a brightly coloured neon waiting room, before being led downstairs to the stage area. The wall decorations were reminiscent of a heavy metal album cover.

If I form a rock band, this will be the cover of our first album

We found ourselves in a large brightly coloured room with three rows of seats on either side and a stage area at each end. Having collected our Bento Box and a small beer we found a seat at one end of the stage on a back row.

The food was minimal and the beer refreshing and this was our meal. What followed was a show that is quite difficult to describe.

On the stage right next to me, a group of scantily clad women suddenly appeared with brightly coloured dragons and started bashing huge bongo drums. Other equally barely dressed young ladies appeared in the centre of the room dancing and playing instruments.

And so it begins

Next, more women appeared, dressed as soldiers, one sitting on a cannon with more playing instruments and dancing.

I'm glad the cannon was pointing the other way

Somebody should say something about those uniforms

“What’s going on?” I asked Mrs PM, feeling a little stupid.

“Absolutely no idea,” she replied.

We were offered a fluorescent tube each and encouraged to wave them about as the next stage of the performance started. More scantily clad women appeared as a precursor to even more robots and women covered in neon tubes, who proceeded to drive around the performance area.

I used the fluorescent tubes in an attempt to kickstart my brain.

It didn't help me understand

From this point on confusion reigned and I simply watched the spectacle in front of me, as huge female robots ridden by more scantily clad women rolled up in front of me. Lasers flooded across the room with loud music blaring out and I blindly waved my fluorescent tube in the air because everybody else was.

More giant robots appeared with more scantily clad women dancing around them and singing songs. At this stage, I decided to simply switch off my brain and go with the flow.

The problem was that I had no idea what the flow was and devolved into a cross between a rabbit caught in the headlights and a young child copying everything everybody else was doing.

Dinosaurs versus Robots

Random Robots

Rise of the Fembota

A Big Mean Robot

Robot Party

Then the show abruptly ended and we were allowed to meet the stars of the show – the fembots, the giant robots the normal sized robots.

My new robot army

Our new pet Robot

“Well that was fun,” I said.

But wait – it wasn’t over. We were all directed back to our seats and the female stars of the show came to each of us in turn and high-fived us. Before I could comment, another group of scantily clad women mounted chairs above us and moved past in unison high-fiving us all as they past while others drove motorbikes and danced.

The climax of the show was the neon tank that I mentioned in my previous post plus a neon aircraft with even more scantily clad women hanging from the wings.

Here is a video that we tried to take to give you some idea of the spectacle that we witnessed.

In fact, if you have seen the Muse video Panic Station the last part of it was filmed in the Robot Restaurant complete with fembots, a dinosaur, the plane and the tank.

I’ll be they had as much fun filming that as we did enjoying this amazing experience.

When I go back to Tokyo, I will go back there, if nothing else to try to make some sense of it all.

Wednesday, 24 June 2015

Cars, Trains, Bikes ... and a Tank

I was looking through some recent photographs and I noticed that I had taken quite a few pictures of various modes of transport.

I’m not really interested in cars, trains and motorbikes to be honest, but when I see an interesting vehicle, I do feel compelled to take a photo of it.

I thought I would share a few with you, dear reader in the hope that you find them as interesting as I did when I captured them, starting with the car above, which I saw at a classic car show in Manchester.

I spotted the car below in a multistory car park in Bordeaux. I think it's meant to serve as a warning to drivers to be careful when driving around corners.

The truck below was parked outside a James Dean themed restaurant in Prague, in the Czech Republic. It was a great advert for a very enjoyable place.

In Collioure, in the south of France, they also use a car to advertise a restaurant.

Regular readers will know that I love the city of Hong Kong and the double-decker trams in that wonderful city are iconic - and cheap too.

In Europe, we rarely see bikes as beautiful as the one below. We have to go across the pond to Boston to catch a glimpse.

Below is another couple of classic cars I spotted at a show in Manchester.

Back across the Atlantic Ocean in Alaska, there is a very enjoyable way to tour Skagway.

In Canada, in the past, a rather special vehicle was required to take tourists onto a glacier.

These days, the Canadians have replaced it with a monster bus whose wheels are almost as tall as I am.

In a warmer climate, its obvious that there are people in Monte Carlo have a little more disposable income than the rest of us.

And a few kilometres away, in the French city of Cannes, the story is the same. Here is a random car I discovered parked outside the shops.

Before the wall came down in Berlin, East Germans drove around in tiny little cars called Trabants. These days, they also use them to advertise shops.

In Japan, you can travel the length and breadth of the country in super fast Shinkansen bullet trains. They roar through train stations at such high velocities that if you are standing on a platform it is actually almost a scary experience. The picture below was my fourth attempt at capturing this magnificent train.

Japan is the only place in the world where you will find a neon tank. It is probably the most wonderful place I have ever visited and probably the strangest too. Only in Japan would you experience the Robot Restaurant and find yourself face to face with the tank below while eating your meal and witnessing what I can only describe as the weirdest but most entertaining show I have ever seen.

I will tell you more about the Robot Restaurant in a future post.

The tank was one of the more sensible parts of the show.

I'll bet you can't wait to hear about it.

Saturday, 29 November 2014

Japanese Delights

One of the many great things about travelling is the variety of food available to try. I like to consider myself as an adventurous person when it comes to trying the delicacies of foreign countries. There are some things that I will not try under any circumstances, things such as insects or snails (mainly because insects and snails make my skin crawl – even when they are alive), but just about anything else is fair game.

I thought I had seen it all on my travels, particularly in China where they eat just about anything. However, Japanese food proved to be just as challenging, and I found myself in a position where I had to pluck up a hidden wedge of courage from a cache that I didn’t know existed within me.

My first encounter with authentic Japanese cuisine came on my very first day in Tokyo. Mrs PM and I visited a small bar/snack bar in the early evening. We sat at the bar, along with everyone else, and watched the bar staff serving beer and cooking food in an open kitchen. The initial idea was to grab a beer and introduce ourselves, slowly to Japanese social culture and watch the people. Mrs PM is far more adventurous than I am and suggested that we try one of the snacks on offer. She signalled the barman who presented us with a small menu written in Japanese with English translations next to it.

Here is what we were given:

I stared at the menu in disbelief. In case you can’t read it, here’s what was on offer:

Trachea, spleen, large intestine, rectum, uterus, small intestine, spinal column, organ (whatever that was – my mind truly boggled), throat, testicles, choice uterus, brain, birth canal.

It looked to me like something out of a hospital or medical laboratory.

The barman offered us “his choice of three items” in broken English.

“NO!!!” we both wailed and opted for a couple of safe items (two lots of bacon and shoulder meat).

A few days later we had immersed ourselves in an authentic Japanese hotel in a place called Hakone, near Mount Fuji, where we enjoyed traditional Japanese experiences such as bathing in an onsen and walking around in kimonos.

We also had to eat in the hotel (it was half board) and we were subjected to a traditional set breakfast and evening meal.

This meant that we basically had to eat everything on offer, no matter how bizarre. Here were some of the choice things we were given for evening meal:

Steamed abalone, conger eel sushi, jellyfish, eel stew, seaweed, bamboo shoot, raw bream.

I had eaten eel stew before in China and I hated it. The Japanese variety was actually quite nice. The thought of eating jellyfish filled me with dread, particularly because these creatures make me shudder with revulsion. Nevertheless, I remembered a time in China when I accidentally ate jellyfish.

“How can you accidentally eat jellyfish?” I hear you cry.

The truth is, I had popped it into my mouth and was busy chewing it when one of my Chinese colleagues asked me what I thought of the fish I was eating.

“It’s a bit rubbery and tasteless,” I replied.

When he told me what it was, it was too late so I simply carried on eating it. Mrs PM wasn’t keen to try it in Japan but when I ate some, she gave it a go.

If I’m honest, had somebody told me it was jellyfish before I had it in my mouth I would have refused with a look of utter disgust.

For breakfast, we were offered things that we wouldn’t normally have considered eating as our first meal of the day. Here are some of the things we were presented with:

Sesame tofu with noodles, fried horse mackerel, miso soup with crab, sashimi squid, sea urchin.

As odd as those things are, nothing had prepared me for sea urchin. I dipped deeply into my reserves of courage and found something that enabled me to try it. I was pleasantly surprised; it wasn’t as bad as I had initially thought – quite tasteless really.

Having eaten in an authentic Japanese hotel restaurant, both Mrs PM and I were no longer worried about what to eat and what not to eat. We ate Japanese food for most of the remainder of our stay, in particular enjoying sushi.

In Kyoto, in a specialist sushi bar, we ordered mixed sushi for lunch. As we were eating, we noticed two older Japanese men next to us, both of whom were quite drunk. What followed was a brilliant exchange with me and Mrs PM speaking to them in English and them replying in Japanese. We had no clue what was being said – and neither did they.

However, the most talkative guy started pointing at the menu as if to say “try this” We politely refused because we had had enough, but before we knew it, he had ordered yet more sushi for us. We guessed it was his favourite fish – and very nice it was too.

Before we knew it, he had bought us a beer each. The one English word he knew was “American” so we spent the rest of our twenty minutes together trying to convince him that we were English. Finally, we bought them a beer back and they took this as a signal that we wanted to carry on drinking with them. They paid and signalled to us, with a variety of hand signals, that we should join them in a bar crawl of Kyoto.

We had to politely refuse because we had a bullet train to catch. I resorted to showing him a photograph of a train to push my point home.

As they wobbled out of the sushi bar, I remarked to Mrs PM that it was a good job he hadn’t bought us something less appetising than sushi. Japanese people are extremely polite and I would have struggled to eat it just to accept his hospitality.

Before I go again, I guess I need to learn the Japanese for:

“I’m sorry I don’t like birth canal, uterus, brain, testicles and organ (whatever the hell that is)”

Sunday, 16 November 2014

The Best Toilet In The World - Ever

When travelling to a foreign country, most people look at practical things such as vaccinations, language, customs, money etc. I do that too, except that there is one thing I add to the list that most people ignore.

Yes, I am going to write about toilets again – I apologise in advance.

Regular readers will know that Chinese toilets make me quake with terror, for reasons, I won’t repeat here (if you really really want to know, try this link).

The good news is that last year I encountered the best toilets in the world.

That honour goes to Japan.

I know you are wondering why I have awarded this prize to Japan, so allow me to explain. The Japanese have done exactly what they do to most things – they have combined technology with a basic human function and come up with a world beater in my humble opinion.

My first experience of a Japanese toilet was memorable.

First, I had an initial shock, when I perched myself on the throne. The seat was warm.

Picture the scene (if you dare). It is a cold winter night in England and I wake up in a cold bedroom with an urge to go to the toilet. I cannot fight this urge so I have to go. I enter the bathroom and see my nemesis in front of me. I know what is going to happen; I am going to have to park my bare backside on a freezing cold toilet seat. I brace myself and just go for it. The seat is so cold that I struggle to stifle the scream of shock.

This did not happen in Japan because a heated toilet seat is completely normal, unlike the UK where they are rare.

Back in Japan, another thing happened when I perched myself on the warm toilet seat; the toilet flushed automatically. Adjacent to the toilet, was a remote control, pictured below.

These are simple things that make you toilet experience very pleasurable. After I had answered my call of nature, I decided to experiment with the remote control. As you can see, the images indicate the function of each button (and thankfully the English translation helped) so it was relatively easy to operate.

I pressed the button marked SPRAY and was so shocked at the outcome that I actually shrieked, prompting Mrs PM to run to the door and ask whether I was okay.

“Yes,” I laughed.

I explained to her what had happened. The button caused a continuous jet of warm water to be sprayed on my backside and my outburst was due to the initial shock of that. Even better you could adjust the water pressure and I spent a good five minutes pushing the + and – buttons to achieve optimal pressure.

I won’t go into any more detail (in the name of good taste), but suffice it to say, I actually looked forward to my trips to the loo.

However, I have to say that not every toilet experience was enjoyable. I did had one potentially embarrassing experience in a café toilet.

I sat down and the first thing that struck me was that the remote control was more complicated, similar to:

I managed to decipher it and enjoyed my experience as usual. But when the time had come to flush, I suddenly realised that there was no handle. The very first toilet had an automatic flush when I sat down (although not a full one) and it also had a handle to use when the job was done.

Not this toilet. I stared at it, perplexed and scratching my head. Unlike my first toilet, there was no English on this one whatsoever. The spray and bidet icons were there but there was nothing that indicated FLUSH.

“Ah,” I thought. “I can sit down again and it will flush automatically.”

It didn’t. The toilet was so clever that it knew I might not have finished. It was TOO clever if you ask me.

I actually sat down again and pushed button after button but to no avail.

What was it looking for?

A combination of buttons?

Did it want me to jump up and down on the seat?

Believe me, I tried that. Anybody waiting outside must have wondered what the mad monster inside was actually doing.

I started to panic, aware that there may be another person waiting to use the loo. I had to solve this; I couldn’t bear the thought of running out of the loo and leaving a horror show in the toilet bowl (I have been on the receiving end of people’s disgusting toilet habits before and it is most unpleasant).

Eventually, more by luck than judgement, I managed to get the thing to flush. I actually whooped with joy and high-fived myself in the mirror – which is doubly embarrassing (a) because I don’t usually high five anybody and (b) because I am English not American.

Yes, that’s right. This stubborn toilet briefly turned me into an American tourist.

When I left the toilet there were two Japanese guys waiting to use it. They smiled politely at me (as Japanese people do) and I tried not to look embarrassed (I think I failed because although I struggled to flush the toilet my face was still flushed).

That aside, I cannot fault Japanese toilets. Yes, they still use the disgusting hole in the floor toilets in some places, but the vast majority are technological marvels.

When I left Japan and reflected on the trip, I decided that I would miss the toilets a lot – and that is something I have never felt when leaving a country.

And now, back in a British winter, I miss them even more.

I might just invest in a heated toilet seat.

Monday, 17 February 2014

500 Posts? Really?

Welcome to my 500th post.

Yes, that’s right; I have written exactly 500 posts of bunkum in the past six years. I’m surprised that I have managed to keep this up to be perfectly honest.

Regular readers will know that I have done a fair amount of travelling, some of it with work and the rest with holidays. In total I have visited thirty six countries (if you count England, Wales, Scotland, Hong Kong, Macau and Vatican City as countries – for poetic license I will do just that!).

I have acquired quite a few photos that are taking up a fair amount of space on my hard drive and for this special post and for a bit of fun, I have decided to share a few of them with you under the guise of lessons learned:

Not all creatures in Australia are out to kill me. Australia is full of venomous spiders, venomous snakes, vicious salties and monstrous jellyfish (and even the platypus has venomous spurs on its ankles) but the cuddly koala is harmless: