Japan, mon amour

It’s been forever – we left Japan 3wks ago and are leaving Vietnam in a few hours, but in this remote border town we finally find the time and a computer that reads my files. It’s taken us hours – though respite comes from the bossy 10yr old boy running this place who occasionally hangs on my shoulder to check out my progress. For now pictures only – videos to come.

Overall, Japan was a huge success for us. We loved the food so much that we took a picture of every meal; we found a great friend in Manabu, our CouchSurfing host; we partied all night at karaoke bars in Tokyo; we spent a week Wwoofing in the Japanese Alps with a generous and inspiring family; we somberly visited Hiroshima and giddily strutted through an onsen (spa town) in our yukatas (robes). Amazing, Done.

Enter Tokyo
Mindblowing. Must see to believe. No more description needed.Photos

Morinoie
MO-REE-NO-EE-EH – our alpine, macrobiotic counterpart to metropolitan Japan. We stayed with a sweet family who taught us a lot about Japanese culture and organic living. Also staying their quaint, traditional Japanese house were other Wwoofers from Louisiana, Mexico, Belgium, Tokyo… and Blendy, a crazy Japanese man who just showed up a few months ago. It was the most peaceful, healthy and balanced week we’ve had this year thanks to Masa, our host, and his way of life. Photos

Kyoto
We spent most of our time away from the big sights of Kyoto, in the temples and Monkey park of Arashiyama and the paths of Fushimi Inari. Photos

Hiroshima – Gifu – Gero
Hiroshima was very emotional, but not always for the obvious reason. Described in guidebooks as “worth going to as a day trip,” in actuality, the friendly people, amazing food and understated culture make it worth much more. Wish we had known. Comorant fishing, or ukai can only be truly appreciated from a torch lit boat on the river. Visitors be warned, it is not for PETA donors.
Gero hot springs are the ultimate relax and the least written about get away spot in our “Rough Guide to Japan.” Walking to and from onsen (natural spas) clad in traditional robes and wooden sandals. Who could ask for more? Photos

Finishing Australia

Yeah, I know, i’m a horrible editor – our blog fan numbers are going to be WAY down since we haven’t posted in a month – no more scolding needed. Here’s everything we wanted to share with you, including a rambling summary intro video:

Animal Videos
Kookaburra Laugh Koala1 Koala2

Melbourne
Pics

St Anton, Austria
Pics

Adrian in Tassie
Pics

One Short Day, in Hong Kong

One Short Day, in Hong Kong

Greg in Nambucca

Nambucca

Byron Bay
Pics

Hobday Chicken Farm

Hobday

Sydney, Redux

Sydney Redux

Soundtrack Update 2

This playlist skews very pop & dance, but excuse us – our only inputs are the radio, dance clubs, and the music video playlist at McDonalds. This is (almost) all Down Under & Euro music, so hopefully exotic for you:

Presets – I Know You [Aussie]

Zoe Badwi – Release Me [Aussie]

Evermore – Hey Boys and Girls [Aussie / NZ]

Florence and the Machine – Dog Days [England]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TwqE2X55Wg

Clavin Harris – I’m Not Alone [Scotland]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clY2RAgXpM0

Elbow – One Day Like This, w/ BBC Orch. [England]

Pussycat Dolls – Jai Ho [India, kinda]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrVlBrooxcM

Franz Ferdinand – No You Girls You Never Know [Scotland]

Tidbits and Shout-outs

Here are some interesting bits we wanted to send home, and some random images. Most of them are boring pictures, but made us think of one of you

Fatties

Almost everyday while we were living in our car included a stop at Mickey-D’s for ice cream… mock, snicker, whatever – they’re DELICIOUS, convenient and cheap (50 Aussie cents and 30, oddly, in the Sydney metro area… basically free).  We had to limit ourselves to 2 per day.

Cuckoo’s Nest

There are a lot of pretty and interesting birds we’ve seen and heard here – the Kookaburra and the Magpie we love… and there’s the Cockatoo.  At first we were excited by the exotic bird just hanging out in the middle of cities, parks, beaches…  but they are F-ing nuts – they screech constantly, swoop around uncontrolled, harass other birds, and knock into things.  We hate the Cockatoo.

Menthol

Like a scorching Hungarian steam room, the forests of Oz are oozing with the scent of Eucalyptus – it’s awesome!  And no fat men in weird torchure devices.

Size Matters

It took a day to get used to, so we can understand the confusion:  the Aussie $2 coins are the smallest of the group – is that why everyone who asks for money on the street asks for no less than 2 – 3 bucks?  Rude

The Rumors Are True

The Aussie beaches are filled with oppressively hot bodies:

Edna for Steven, Adam, and Kyle – she’s plastered over the whole MAC counter at Myer, the big Aussie dept. store.

For Jenny & Kevy – Saint’s Alp in Hong Kong!

For Brad – They have the Long Way Round / Long Way Down DVDs at truck stops in the middle of the outback.  I couldn’t believe it when i saw it!

For Ky – I was close, but i only had about 8hrs, so  Hong Kong Disneyland got cut from the itinerary.  All i got you was these ears on the highway sign

For Gary & the other NYU mo’s – tear :_(

For the other mo’s – did we know that there is a sovereign Gay and Lesbian Kingdom that succeeded from Australia!?  Here are their stamps, found because of the philatelist i travel with, and some INFO

Great Ocean

 Here is the next installment of pics.  We drove the famed “Great Ocean Road” that the Aussies are very proud of.  We stopped to hike, spelunk, and beach and hunt for more wildlife.

More videos coming soon…

Great Ocean Pics

View Larger Map

Radio Australiana

Adrian and i have been spending a lot of time in our car for the past 3wks – it’s been an adventure: driving on the left, blown gaskets, uncontrollable blinking lights, “hook turns”*, floods, deserts, freezing, sweating, our flannel Dino sheets, shadily looking for places to park for the night, and the inevitable deterioration of the cleanliness of the place we eat, sleep and spend most of our time.

BUT – we have fallen in love with Australian radio.  It’s an amazing mix of new and old, american, european and Australian music with shockingly irreverent sex ads, uncensored DJs, and the most multicultural and random stuff.   To be fair, we never listen to the radio in NYC so it’s altogether a new experience, and it is summer here so everything has more life and energy, but we blast it anyway.

Unfortunately, most of the Australian artists we’ve heard has been really boring metal-y rock, or uninspired and whiny emo.

We listen to classic rock, 90′s alternative, classical and opera, talk radio… and, of course, the best pop anyone has ever heard!  They play fresh mash-ups that never get old, and the DJs actually mix the songs so you get a non-stop 10min block of music… Adrian and i obviously go crazy in the car, dancing and singing – you can all picture the ridiculousness.  And this is not just Friday nights – it’s when we wake up every morning!  It makes you feel like the Australians are always partying!  And they don’t just remix pop-y dance songs – in the past 2 days we’ve heard Coldplay and Led Zeppelin remixed really well – Adrian was obviously beside himself.

Check out these few from our playlist.  Don’t judge the videos, we’ve never seen them:

**Get Shaky – The Ian Carey Project – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZfWLs05bo0 - the gays will love this

The Fear – Lily Allen – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-wGMlSuX_c - Fatty, this is totally you

Kids – MGMT – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIobf__8V2w

Too Many Dicks – Flight of the Conchords – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-EN8dpAvBw

Everybody’s Free – Global DJ / Klaas Remix / Rozalla – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmyVG1xsYlg&feature=related 

Sex is on Fire – Kings of Leon – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHhhcKxflMY

Work – Kelly Rowland – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P9G-kAmRS4

* “hook turn”: in downtown Melbourne, the only way to make a right turn is to pull over far to the left into the crosswalk and jet across 4 lanes of cars and 2 of trams as the light changes… someone please find me the crazy-ass urban planner who thought of this one.

Thousands of miles in 2 weeks

Check out this video intro – it says more than we can type here:

Here are all the Facebook picture albums and Youtube playlists – enjoy:

Into the Jungle:

Pics – Video

Great Barrier Reef:

Pics – Video

Escape the flood:

Pics – Video

Outback:

Pics1 – Pics2 – Video

Sydney

Hello!

This is our first, and retroactive, post – most of you have heard the stories from our first week here, but please see the Facebook album below for the pictures.

Sydney is really fun and beautiful – the weather was flawless everyday, the people are as friendly an generous as their reputation predicted, and the architecture and landscape of the city and environs was really beautiful. We met Brian in our hostel – a Canadian kid with no plans at all for his year in Aus. (he just walked from the airport until he found a place to sleep). We splurged one night and had a great night out on the town – met a ton of people who were happy to show us around until 5am. We fell in love with the Surry Hills part of town, gorged ourselves on the ludicrously cheap fruit at Paddy’s market, watched the bats fly every night from the Royal Botanic Gardens, and tried out Manly, Coogee and Bondi beaches…

Typically Greg, as we were crossing a random street we ran into Boaz, a friend from NYU.

Overall, we had the weird suspicion that Sydney was a theme park. Clues include: oddly numerous public toilets, monorail running through downtown, spotlessly clean sidewalks, arcades and people walking away with prizes, abundance of parks and fountains, all the infrastructure was hidden behind decoration or art, most shops closing promptly at 6pm, a small train carrying people around… and lastly: the unreal amount of malls and foodcourts – the majority of shops and restaurants do not have street access and most people throughout the day can be found eating in humungous foodcourts… the Aussies love their malls and foodcourts!

PS – check out our album of the signage at our first beach town:

MANLY

Our old Facebook album: http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=816678&k=53G4YXP3444MZ1EIVK2TX