Beware Bobbed Beauties

We interrupt our anything-but-regularly scheduled programming for a special bulletin:

I've got a new post up over at PimpKnowledge!  I'm laying down the truth about France's favorite Manic Pixie Dream Girl.

http://www.pimpknowledge.com/the-amelie-dilemma/

Hide your lawn ornaments!

The tofu-strewn road to Kyoto

Taiwan is offering up a formidable winter this year.  The past few weeks have been mostly wet, cold, and dreary.  Yesterday the sun made a brief appearance and then apparently decided to leave us to our sad fates, because today was yet another long, dark day of the Taiwan soul.  I took advantage of the brief reprieve yesterday to explore the northern end of the Gongguan bike path.  The hours I spent cycling back and forth, with no deadline, and no destination, brought to mind the late night drives I used to take in high school.  At that time, everything moved way too slowly, and I yearned for life to speed up.  I yearned for arrival.  This impatience would build up and, coupled with my chronic insomnia, would propel me out the door and into the car.  I would drive for hours, directionless.  Sometimes I stopped by the beach to hear the soothing crash of the waves.  Mostly I just hoped the continued movement would assuage my teen-angst.  Now a night like that seems fairly impossible.  First of all, life has become all about speed - events end seemingly moments after they start.  We feel a constant pressure to determine our next turn; we fear uncharted courses. Yes, it was a simpler time back then.  That, and gas was a much, much cheaper.

That will be $60, thanks.

There are still certain situations in which we are forced  to slow down: stomach flu and travel disasters. Luckily, this post does not involve bouts of stomach flu.  No, this post is about what may well be the most convoluted trip from Tokyo to Kyoto known to modern man.  First let's review the amount of time it usually takes to make this trip: by train, anywhere from 2 to 4 hours; by bus you're looking at 7-8.  For my sister and I, it took a solid 10.  Now, before you all go and chalk this up to some special Smela trait, some family ability to weed out the most bizarrely inefficient travel arrangements possible, let it be known that my sister did some excellent research before this trip.  She had figured out a way that we could travel to Kyoto almost entirely for free, thanks to a special rail pass available over the holidays.  It would involve a bunch of transfers, but hey, free is good!  No, we are definitely going to have to place some of the blame squarely on the shoulders of the Japanese Rail System.  

The trip followed this general pattern: we arrived at the station, showed our ticket (which was supposed to entitle us to free rides during the national holiday), and were promptly told that the first leg of our trip would, in fact, not be free, it would instead cost $60.  But the tickets should work everywhere else so, hey, no worries, just pay up and be on your way.  During the second leg of our trip, when the conductor came over to check our tickets he promptly told us that this leg of our trip would, in fact, not be free, it would instead cost another $60.  At this point my sister got a bit suspicious and checked on the rest of our itinerary with him.  The conductor told us that our next planned transfer would,  in fact, not be free, it would instead cost yet another $60.  Clearly the Japanese travel website my sister has used was, at the very least, misguided in its listing of acceptable trains we could use with this ticket.  Luckily, this kind conductor worked out an itinerary we could use our tickets on.  This itinerary would stretch our travel time out to a whopping 10 hours, but we had already paid $120 plus the cost of the "rail pass" and we were not prepared to spend anymore.  We decided to settle in for the long haul.  

Let's just note, for the record, that the 2 hour long bullet train trip costs.....$120.  Damn you Japanese Rail System!!!!!

The view from our 10 hour train ride.
Why do I miss all the good snowpocalypses?

But you know what?  This ended up being one of the highlights of the trip.  Susie and I had years of catching up to do. Major life events needed to be recounted.  Personal revelations needed to be shared.  We spent the full 10 hour train ride talking, with brief pauses to be dazzled by the jaw-dropping-ly beautiful scenery. This gave us a bit more mental space to take in the refined splendor of Kyoto.  We saw glittering golden temples, minimalist wooden temples, and cherry-red temples situated atop quaint old-fashioned market streets (which were filled with massively overpriced stuff, but hey, it's Japan.  The whole point is to leave with not a cent to your name, right?)  We ate twelve different kinds of tofu, including these outrageously good grilled tofu skewers slathered with miso paste.  They were delicate morsels of velvety decadence.  We wandered through the old Geisha neighborhood (lanterns!  hidden alleyways!)  We ducked into multiple izakayas to ward off the endless cold (gyoza!  fried chicken!)  We found a bar that sold beer, snacks, and collectible figurines (Run DMC action figures!!!!!  Which I'm sure cost so much I would have had to sell a kidney to afford just one!)  And we ended our night with some of the best vegetables I've had yet in Asia: sweet, vinegary boiled spinach with rock salt for dipping, and the only lotus root I'll ever love.

I love you, lotus root. You complete me.

Thus ends part two of Hungry Like the Wolf's Epic Sister Reunion Episode.  Still to come: a thorough exploration of Osaka's gay nightlife, and a pile of conveyor belt sushi so high it makes Taipei 101 look like shack.  

And now, to play us out, here are some photos of Kyoto brought to you by my poor, struggling camera, Mr. Blurry:

The Smelas Take Kyoto.  Super Asian!

The Golden Pavillion

Here are a few shots of a solo-trip I took to the Shogun Palace.

The entrance to the Shogun Palace.  

Pictures of the inside of Casa de Shogun are forbidden,
but the grounds are fair game, and pretty impressive to boot.
At least, Mr. Blurry seemed to approve.

The Shogun's cul-de-sac.   

 Interesting fact - closing time at Shogun-palooza is signaled by playing Auld lang syne on repeat.  Apparently that song actually translates as, "Thank you for visiting the Shogun.  Now get the hell out."

The street with that name beside that place with the temple.

The aforementioned temple!

Mr. Blurry has the soul of an artist,
and the hand-eye coordination of a sleepy two-year old.

Thank you for visiting Hungry Like the Wolf.  Now get the hell out!

Brains! It's what's for dinner.

Hello devoted readers.  I'm sure that by now you're tired of reading about the same old meals: dumplings, dumplings, and more dumplings.  Never fear!  The good people over at www.pimpknowledge.com have given me a forum to discuss some more....unusual fare.  So don your most Kramer-esque pimp hat and do some reading.

http://www.pimpknowledge.com/zombies-are-here-sexy-vampires/

The Cold and the Ravenous: Tokyo Drift

Growing up, I was one of those kids who always believed she had a secret twin or long lost older sibling out there, just waiting to be discovered.  Yes, there are certain advantages to being an only child, but by early adolescence I had negotiated those waters long enough to be absolutely thrilled when I gained not one, but two younger sisters.  Of course, since we were separated by both time and geography we didn't get to experience all of the standard sibling joys and conflicts: no toys were co-opted, no diaries read (after all, that's what Stepmothers are for, right?)  Our time spent together always involved travel, either me to their home in the city, or occasionally them to my home in the suburbs.  So it's only fitting that after too long a separation my sister Susie and I would plan an epic reunion halfway around the world.  Well, okay.  We actually both live in Asia right now.  So you could say that I was "in the neighborhood and decided to stop by".  But I prefer the epic-reunion-half-a-world-away narrative, so we're sticking with that.

I did not know what to expect from our Japan trip, and frankly I was nervous, maybe even a bit scared.  My sister and I hadn't seen each other in years, and this meeting had the prospect of unearthing a wealth of terrible family drama.  In some ways I think the painful family history made me more restrained than it did her.  My Buddhist younger sister has learned to forgive and accept things that I'm still coming to terms with.  

It was so cold even the statues
needed sweaters.

But this is not a tragic memoir! This is a food and travel blog, and therefore we must press on with discussions of epicurean delights.  I had a day and half in Tokyo before meeting up with Susie, and I started out with my usual chaotic travel pattern: hours of aimless walking which led to my getting hopelessly lost when a mere three blocks from home, and all of this providing an excellent excuse for eating really good food.  One thing about Japan that must be mentioned - it's cold.  As in, painfully cold.  And my first night there was rainy and awful.  (Side note - I'm writing this from the sunny beach at Kenting, and the music at the Happy Panda Bar is so crushingly bad that I'm in danger of going deaf from my preventative ipod measures.  Really, is this their business plan?  Drive us to drink?  Anyway, back to Japan).  The bitter cold was not alleviated by my inadequate shoes, coat, gloves, and non-existent umbrella.  But I still managed to take in the Asakusa temples by night, enjoy over-priced yakitori, and finally discover the warmth that only spicy ramen can bring.  Now, while this ramen was spicy, it was also a bit tomato-y.  My previous ramen experiences had not prepared me for this.  Was it supposed to be that way?  Have I been wrong all these years?  The meat was good, but not "melt in your mouth" good.  In fact, the best thing that can be said about this ramen shop is that it existed, and gladly welcomed a white girl who bore a striking resemblance to a drowned rat.  The soup could have been Campbell's Chicken Noodle and I would have attacked it like it was my last meal.  Any port in a storm.  Literally.  

You're suspect, ramen.  Suspect.

Yes, this photo is blurry, but when you compare it to the much
blurrier photos it becomes a work of genius.  

The next day dawned a crisp, cold blue.  I returned to the Asakusa temples and experienced the standard tourist side of things: crowds, kids, and kimonos.  This was followed by a walk through inokashira park in kichijoji which, strangely enough, made me quite nostalgic for Berlin.  What was it?  The spare delicacy of the barren branches?  Or the fact that I couldn't feel my toes?  (Side note: Dear sweet lord, the Happy Panda music.  Why would someone do this to another human being?!?!?)  But I digress.  We're not in Berlin (or Kenting, for that matter.)  We're in Japan. (Further side note: the more I travel, the more easily I transport mentally to a previous trip or a plan for a new one.  It's as though time and space is coalescing into one great, big vacation.  This may not be a good thing.)  But Japan!  Tokyo!  What did I eat? Lots of tempura, because I was freezing and therefore deserved fried food.  Tender, salty yakitori.  A particularly satisfying bowl of chirashi.  Generally, anything I could find that cost less than the US debt to China.  I was prepared for prices more in the range of NYC than Taipei, but that didn't make them any easier to deal with.  So yeah, I ate a lot of what I can only assume would be considered Japanese fast food.  Finally, adorable kichijoji shops thoroughly explored, I went back to the hostel to prepare for the big reunion.  I killed time by helping a Frenchman prep his audition for a British dental commercial (over red wine, of course).  Then Susie arrived, and it was once again like existing in several times at once.  I was 12, 20, 27, 36.  Susie was an infant, child, and teenager living in the body of a wise, kind, and curious adult.  How did we get here?  How did we make it through the passage of time and history?  I can't answer that, but I can tell you that the next day we embarked on a 10 hour train ride to Kyoto.  And yes, it was epic.  

To be continued, hopefully sometime within this calendar year....

Help me yakitori!
You're my only hope!

And as promised, kimonos.