and I'm jetlagged.
I don't even know where to start with this, how to tell you about the things we did, without being boring and/or long-winded. It was a mixed bag of amazing and terrible. I know, I know... you should never come back from a 'trip of a lifetime' kind of of holiday and tell people about the bad bits. It's just not good form. You are meant to rave about how brilliant it was and make everybody jealous. But here's the thing - I can't handle eating such salty food all the time (seriously, I thought the skin on my face would fall off after just two days!); we had jetlag, especially the poor husband, who barely slept the whole week, and we had to spend two and a half days in Himeji on his conference, which boasts one of the most stunning castles in Japan but precious little else, so I was bored (until I discovered the department store :-) More about that some other time).
I will be writing about the food we ate over on my other blog later this week, so check it out if you're interested in stuff like that. I mean, the large part of our trip to Japan was about the food - it was a kind of pilgrimage, if you will. So, to be truthful, the things that made my heart leap, the sights that made me shake with awe mostly involved things I could put into my mouth. I'm sorry. I am a cultural retard and should be punished for not appreciating the beauty of the country as much as its food. But that's just who I am. I like to eat.
Apart from stuffing our faces, what did we do? We saw stunning temples and shrines, we wandered around some beautiful gardens, watched monks praying whilst surrounded by a thousand gold statues. But best of all, we visited the vast wholesale market at Tsukiji in the freezing dawn to dodge the terrifying forklift trucks and to eat the most mind-blowing sushi I've ever had. The photos below are of that market, where immense tuna are sold by auction and you can walk past hundreds of stalls selling any kind of seafood you could dream of; creatures I'd never even seen in my life. It was awe-inspiring.
I am still processing a lot of ideas and impressions, and will write more throughout the week. I might go back to bed now...
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Glad to have you back!
ReplyDeleteThe fish make me sad. Some of these fish might go extinct soon :(
I love the pylons and giraffe photo though! I love taking strange photos of electricity pylons and things.
It reminds me that I need more square photos too. Square photos were made for blogs!
I know. I suppose you've got to be careful where all this fish is coming from and how it's caught etc. It's hard enough trying to be good about stuff like that in England let alone Japan where the problem is potentially worse :-( I try not to eat fish that isn't sustainable sourced, but it's not always easy. Funnily enough, we didn't eat all that much fish in Japan - I had sushi just once and a couple of bits of salmon or herring elsewhere. Ate mostly noodles and curry rice and other trashy stuff :-)
ReplyDeleteYeah, square photos rock. I crop as many of my pictures to a square format now. They look good on blogs. Glad you liked the giraffe - weird eh?