Shinkansen!

Hello everyone, and by everyone, I mean the two people who read this blog. (kamikaze, you're wonderful for my ego!) Actually, I was kinda surprised how many people actually spent the time to read my epically long posts.

I have since been back in the states for almost 3 months now, and it was quite scary to find out how many people had free time to read about my silly exploits painted as these amazingly colorful sagas. haha. Anyways, I am finally getting around to putting up the rest of my pictures from Japan now after much nudging from said people with no lives.

The next 大冒険 (daibouken!) I'm going to describe is actually something that millions of people do every few hours: ride the shinkansen.

I traveled to the Kansai area for about a week (which I'll talk about later) and the best way to get there from Tokyo, is by shinkansen, or bullet train. It cost me about 3 hours and $100, (￥10,000) which is really cheap, but what can I say, I'm just savvy like that. haha.

First I had to get to either Tokyo or Shinagawa stations in Tokyo to catch the shinkansen to Shin-Osaka station. So, I just took the train and used my handy little suica card just like all the other Japanese people and not like a huge gaij. yay! But then I sat in the reserved seating section and some guy came along and was like, "ummm....I think you're in my seat. May I see your ticket?" at which point I had to get up and move to one of the three unreserved cars and slink away in embarrassment, like a huge gaij. That's one strike towards true nihonjinness and one strike for gaij-ness.

After finally finding a seat in one of the two non-smoking, non-reserved cars, I immediately took out my camera and took pictures. Strike 2 for gaij-ness. But it was so pretty! Even though I was stuck on a train for 3 hours, it didn't seem like that long at all! First of all, the train is ridiculously fast, but also amazingly steady. Nothing like the 3 hour trek from Sacramento to San Jose on Amtrak.

Once we got out of the city landscape, I began to feel like I was in Miyazaki's "My Neighbor Totoro."

I mean really, look at that! Can't you see Satsuki running between the fields barefoot looking for Mei? Nekobasu totally just ran by and you missed it. Referencing anime = strike 1 towards otaku-ness.

Also, saw palm trees. I just have one question: ahem. What the hell are palm trees doing on the river banks of central JAPAN?!!! It was so out of place I didn't even know what to do with that piece of information. Looks like Santa Monica or something... Seeing California in Japan = strike 3 towards gaij-ness. damn.

I also got to see Fuji!!!! But since it was the middle of summer, there was very little snow on the top which was kinda of disappointing. The two little slivers of white at the top looked like the gods were screwing around and accidentally dripped some paint on the picture. oops.

On the other hand, with the clouds and mist, Fuji was floating above the human world for me.

By far the most unnerving thing about riding the shinkansen was when we went into a tunnel. I was staring out the window with my face plastered against it, in awe of the beauty of Japan's country side. Then we would enter a tunnel and everything would go pitch black out side, replacing whatever it was I was looking at with the ridiculous expression on my face. Funky stupid expression = strike 4 towards gaij-ness. I'm a total gaij.

And that was my amazing adventure on the shinkansen! It was actually quite ordinary by Japanese standards, but I'm a gaij, and actually glad for it. All the other salarymen around me were just reading the paper telling them about things going on miles away from them and missing the simplest form of wonder and happiness. As for me, besides the stupid face of wonderment, when we entered a tunnel, often a content Mona Lisa smile and wide happy eyes were waiting for me. ^^