Help if you can

A friend of my co-workers has been in a serious accident and needs all the help she can get. She is an English teacher in Vietnam. This is a situation that I could find myself in too, as I do not have comprehensive traveler's insurance. Take a look, and if you feel compelled, please donate. Remember, every little bit helps.

As some of you may know by now my good friend Julie Swinden (who used to work and live in South Korea with me) was in a motorbike taxi accident in Vietnam on the 21st January and has suffered serious head injuries which resulted in 2 operations within the first 24 hours and still more treatment is needed.
She is in a Vietnam hospital but in order to get more treatment and to get her back home and on the mend her family needs some funds to Medivac her back to New Zealand when she is stable enough and to continue on the road to recovery.
I am trying to help raise money as it cost loads for Medivac let alone the costs that are being incurred in Vietnam.
If you can please help out in anyway that would be amazing and I'm sure she will be extremely grateful when she is recovering back at home in New Zealand with all of her family and friends around her.
The website to make a donation is.. here
Thanks heaps

Hair today, gone tomorrow

I tend to get bored with my hair rather quickly. I got in the habit of cutting my own hair in the states, but when it's curly you can make small mistakes and no one will ever know. So since I decided to straighten my hair, I've been going to a shop to have someone cut it for me. The lady who owns it is the only one that works there, and she doesn't speak a word of English. But she's nice, and she knows what she's doing, I trust her, and cuts, styles and coloring is cheap. Anyways, I decided I wanted something completely different, as the one she'd given me before was a bit...well...Asian. So, I printed a few pictures and brought them in to her, and left with something a bit funky and a bit more... me.


I like it, and my friends seem to like it too (which is always a good thing). I went out with some old and some new friends on Saturday night for dinner and an open-mike. It was Ben's first time eating galbi - a common Korean meal where you put meat on an open grill at the table.

Ben and Hong with their Hite aprons.

Laura playing music on the Coke and Cass bottles

Dayna and Ill-Quon with their jiggae and galbi

After dinner, Ben went home, and the rest of us went out to an open-mike, where Christian was supposed to play his guitar and sing, but through a misunderstanding was taken off the bill. I did get to see everything from spoken words to belly-dancing to techno music.

Dayna and I at the open-mike. She lives in Seoul now, so I won't get to see her as often.

Today I slept in all day because I got home so late from Saturday (the subway stops running at midnight, and doesn't start again until 5:30am), and woke up just in time to go to my weekly Korean lesson. I've only had 3 so far, but I'm slowly getting better, and I know a bit more basic vocabulary. Like, they don't have names for months, it's just 1st month, 2nd month, etc (which makes it easier to remember.) Afterward I went to a coffee shop to grab some coffee before going home, since I wanted to stay awake long enough to study. Apparently I go to the shop more often than I thought (it's right across the street from work and a 10 minute walk from my house), either that or not many foreigners come there. Either way the girls at the shop recognized me, and the fact that I'd gotten a hair cut. Their verdict was "New! Oh, good job!"

So that was my not-very-exciting weekend, but then again most of my weekends aren't nearly as exciting as skiing, going to Japan, or meditating with monks.

It's not a controlled descent!

I go to dinner every Wednesday night with other foreigners around Uijeongbu. Dayna usually goes to these as well, though she is moving into Seoul this week and probably won't be joining us anymore. This week at dinner, she asked me if I was interested in going skiing with her and Hong, her Korean boyfriend. I had been wanting to try skiing, and I always enjoy hanging out with Dayna, so I said of course! Hong had booked the hotel room, the bus, and the lift tickets ahead of time as a package deal.

We left at 8:15 on Saturday morning (which meant I had to be in Sincheon by 7:45, which meant I had to be on the subway in Uijeongbu by 6:45, which meant I had to be on the bus by 6:15, which meant I had to be out of the house by 6:05, which meant waking up at 5:30. This is why I want to live in Seoul.). The bus took about 4 hours to get to 고한(Gohan), which means "high land". It's waaaay up in the mountains, and very far north - Hong said you could see North Korea from the top of the mountains (but according to my map it's actually east south east of Uijeongbu). We went to a resort called High1 Resort.

We went all the way to the top of the mountain on the bus, and then followed Hong into a gondola, to get back down to the bottom.

A view of a gondola, from a gondola.

The view down to the ski resort

A view of the chalet. I was so impressed that it looked like something out of a movie!

He called the ski rental place, and they sent a van to pick us up and take us to the shop, which was conveniently located next door to our hotel (a result of good planning on Hong's part). There are different kinds of boots for skis and snowboards, so Hong and Dayna got snowboard boots, and Christian, Laura and I got ski boots. Laura was a friend of Dayna's, and Christian is her boyfriend. They're both devout Christians, and want to become missionaries. I normally wear a size 280 shoe in Korea (size 11 women's). I always get funny looks when I ask for this size, as it is abnormally large for women here. I thought the 280 fit ok, until I actually started walking towards the van. My feet scrunched up and felt like they were going to cramp, and I couldn't move my toes at all. So we asked them for a bigger size. They didn't really have any, but they tried and basically just got me a different style of the same size that they slightly adjusted with a screwdriver. These were also a bit small, but they didn't have anything else, so I decided to just grin and bear it.

We decided to go back to the hotel room and get some lunch since it was after 2 and we hadn't eaten since before we got on the bus. We ordered pizza to the room, and the five of us ate on the floor of the room that Dayna, Hong and I were sharing.

A warning label for the escape route from our tenth floor hotel window - you attach yourself to a rope and climb out.

We were satiated and ready to go a bit past three, and by this time it had started snowing. I was fascinated by the snow- this time it was little tiny snowballs, almost like miniature hail, instead of the small snowflakes that I had been seeing. The rental van took us back up to the slopes, and we hustled out to the lifts.

(Author's note: I was forbidden, for obvious reasons, from taking my camera on the slopes with me the first day. All the subsequent pictures, except when noted, are from my second day, but for illustration's sake will be used as if they were taken on the first.)

Seeing as how I'd never even seen a ski up close, let alone used one before, my friends were very patient and helpful with me, showing me how to put on my skis, and how to walk in them to get to the lifts. There were two options when you leave the chalet - both of them beginner's runs. Since we hadn't been on either, we randomly chose the one on the left, the Zeus.

All the runs were named after Greek gods and goddesses.

The Jupiter run turned out to be half as long as the Zeus run.

So you put your lift pass somewhere in your clothes on the left side of your upper torso, since it's a hands-free scanner that reads the card through your clothes to let you onto the lift. Six people fit on each lift seat, and you stand on a ledge of sorts, waiting for the lift to come and hit you from behind to make you sit down. As you go up, your skis and poles are hanging over nothing, which explained the one or two ski poles that we saw under the lift. I went on the first lift with Christian and Laura, and Dayna and Hong went on the one behind us.

Laura's picture of the three of us on the lift

A view from the lift to the ground through my skis. I was fascinated by the footprints, as I could see both human and animal tracks.

I was also impressed by the garbage can they had constructed: a large gated area where you simply dropped your trash from the lift shortly before you reached the end. This way the ski patrol only had to clean one small area instead of under the entire lift.

I love it when people think ahead like this.

As we were going up the lift, we passed the end of the Jupiter line, and we realized we'd gone on the longer of the two runs. I would later come to further realize this seemingly random decision would have an enormous impact on the rest of my day.

The lift exit for Jupiter. Notice the orange pads, in case you fall off the lift a bit too early.

So we continued on up the slope, and I continued to enjoy the view and the pleasant rocking of the lift (not at all concerned about falling, but rather marveling at the engineering and physics that allowed 6 people and their ski equipment to balance on a rope and a pole for hundreds of meters.)

A view of the Zeus run from the lift

When we got to the top, I was forewarned that getting of the lift is actually the hardest part. It requires a bit of skill, coordination, and upper body strength, none of which I seemed to posses at that moment in time, so I fell off immediately upon impact, laughing the whole time. Laura did her best to try to teach me, but I seemed unable to understand how "pizza" and "french fries" were going to be of any use to me (they refer to the shape of your skis, with either the fronts pointing towards each other in a triangular shape, or parallel to each other). It turned out all I ever really used was pizza anyways, since that's the stance you use to brake, or slow yourself down.

Christian, Laura, and me in high spirits before hitting the slopes. And I do mean that literally.

This picture of me was taken by Laura without my knowledge, and gives the false impression that I actually knew what I was doing.

Hong and Dayna arrived, and Hong was a bit better at explaining exactly what I should be doing with my feet and skis, so Christian and Laura said they'd see us later. I didn't see them the rest of the day.

Dayna and Hong with their snowboards

Hong continued to coach me for about 15-20 minutes, explaining in detail what I needed to do, and showing me first how to get my skis off when I'd fallen (it's nigh impossible to stand up with your skis on if you're on the ground), and then, most importantly, how to turn. This was to be my hardest lesson of the day. I picked up rather quickly that I had to point your toes towards each other to slow down, and if my feet were parallel and facing down the mountain, it was going to be a rather uncontrolled decent to the bottom. The hardest part for me was becoming accustomed to the feeling of being on skis, and realizing which of the feelings meant I was going to fall and which of them was simply me learning my balance all over again. This included turning.

Normally when you turn, for instance on a bike or in a car, you slow down. This is because you can lose control more easily on a turn. This is a concept that I became aware of while playing video racing games before I could drive (why do I have to put on my brakes in the turn? you mean I can't make a 90 degree turn at full speed? why?). This is not the case when you ski, at least for a beginner. As a novice, it was my intention to reduce the amount of the slope to a more acceptable level - i.e. completely flat. This meant weaving back and forth across the run so that I was going practically perpendicular to the run, rather than parallel. This also meant, that as I would reach the side of the slope, that I would have to turn to face the other side. It is an inevitability that as you turn to face the other way, that at some point your skis will then be facing directly down the mountain, even if only for a moment. This has the undesired effect of speeding up the novice skier in the process of a turn. This is not an easy feeling to get used to.

So, once I had learned, at least in theory, how to turn, stop, and get up once I'd fallen, I released Hong and Dayna to allow them to have fun, while I proceeded to learn how to ski on my own. At first I was immensely surprised at how physically difficult it was to ski. I had thought that you simply stood on the skis, allowing gravity to do it's thing, and simply enjoying a controlled descent down the mountain. This is not the case. Not even remotely. I found muscles in the backs of my legs I didn't know I had. You have to clinch and tighten just about every muscle in your legs to make the skis go the correct angle, both against each other and against the snow. It takes a bit of practice to figure out how much of an angle will allow how much braking power. I got sore rather quickly, and didn't mind falling down at all, because it allowed me to sit and rest for a while and watch the other skiers and snowboarders.

A view of the Zeus run

I found out that I am a great coach for myself. I began to talk out loud, creating a one-sided dialogue that sounded more like what my dad sounded like when he was teaching me how to ride a bike (and yes, I do attribute learning that to my father, and not that babysitter from way-back-when). Something along the lines of "Ok, you're coming up to a turn. Alright, so if you want to turn left, which you do, you need to lean right. Ok, so here's a clean-looking patch of snow, let's aim for that and try to turn there. Ready? Ok, now lean, that's it, keep going, that's it, you've got it, just a little bit more now, keep leaning, don't panic, it's alright, you got it, you got it, see? There, now just keep your toes together, remember A line, alright, don't worry about that guy that whizzed past you, he can steer and you can't so just keep going. Alright head for that sign over there and we're gonna try to turn again." And so on. It was rather encouraging, actually, and much better company that actually having someone else saying that to me, which eventually I would have found annoying. I had the added bonus of being on a Korean slope, so the likelihood was very high that even if someone could hear me talking, they wouldn't know what I was saying.

By the time I reached the end of the slope I was utterly exhausted. It had felt like a long time, but I had enjoyed the challenge of something new. I had talked with a friend a while back about when people try something for the first time and aren't good at it, they often give up because it's much more pleasant when you're actually good at something. This particular friend hated bowling because he was terrible at it. I remember thinking that I'm not that great at bowling either (despite the fact that I have a varsity letter in the sport), but I love it because it's a chance to hang out with friends and do something fun and constructive, instead of eating or drinking all the time. Life is what you make it (to quote a wise man I know), and I chose to make this a fun weekend. So instead of getting entirely too frustrated with myself for constantly falling down, and not being able to make visible progress down the run, and feeling depressed as I watched the sun go down, the slopes get dark, and the number of people passing me decrease, I simply chose to enjoy myself. I chose to enjoy the alone time that I had, enjoy the snow, enjoy the people around me having fun, enjoy the challenge of something new and exciting, and to just keep going. It took me over three hours to get down that slope, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

I called Dayna when I finally got to the end of the run, and she sounded surprised that I was in such high spirits. They had been worried about me because they hadn't heard from me in so long, and had been wondering if I was ok. I assured them that I was fine, but that I was really thirsty and needed some water. So I stashed my skis outside and headed into the chalet to get some water.

A locker of sorts where you can lock your snowboard or skis if you don't want to drag them inside with you. Yet another smart idea.

We sat down and I pulled by boots off, as my toes had gone numb from lack of circulation, not the cold. While I drank my fill of water, Dayna and I talked for a bit, and took a picture with a Korean guy dressed in a cow ski suit from head to toe (We took it with his camera and he promised to send Dayna the pictures via email since neither of us had our cameras on us). When I was ready to try one more time going down the smaller Jupiter slope, I tried to get my boots back on, but was unable to, I'm guessing because my feet were too swollen and they had been too small to begin with. So I decided to call it a day, and Hong called the rental place for me and Dayna and we headed back to the hotel.

After luxuriating in a 3-inch hot bath (they didn't have drain plugs to save water, but I was gonna be darned if there was a bathtub in my room and I didn't use it. I used a towl to stop up the drain.), Dayna and I hung out in the room until Christian and Laura came back. We waited a bit for Hong, but then when he arrived he said he'd already eaten on the slopes. So we ordered in Korean food (I had mandu, or Korean dumplings), and ate and talked until around 11, when I suggested we go to bed so we could hit the slopes early the following day.

Kids playing in the snow by one of the lifts

We woke up around 9 on Sunday, and were on the slopes by 10. I went on the Jupiter run twice with Dayna.

Dayna and I on day two

At the top of the Zeus run, with the Zeus 2 run behind me.

I'm ready!!

A luge-type setup for snowboarders and skiers.

As we were getting ready to go up to the Zeus, I realized that I had lost my lift pass. I'd put it in my larger gloves since I didn't have a pocket in my jacket, and I'd taken my gloves off on the lift because they were too warm and forgot the pass was in there. We had to call Hong and try to figure something out. At first I thought about just buying another pass for the day, but a half day was almost 50,000won ($50), so I ixnayed that idea. Hong thought of calling the rental place to see if Christian and Laura had picked up their passes for the day, and they hadn't. So we asked them to bring us the passes, and to fix Hong's snowboard (it was set up for a righty, not a lefty). We decided that I'd use the pass until either it was time to go, or they left the hotel room and wanted to go skiing, and then I'd give it back. After getting my new pass, I made it back down the Zeus a few more times, decreasing my time from three hours to 18minutes and 50 seconds.

A view of some of the harder runs from the Zeus lift

I guess the lift attendants got bored and made a 'skiman' next to their snowmobile.

As I was getting ready to head in for the day, I got a text from Christian, saying that I should try the green Hera if I thought I could, and that I would really like it. It turned out that Dayna hurt her knee so she gave her pass to Laura, and Christian got his from Hong and they were on the slopes. I debated for a moment, and then decided I should at least try. So I headed back up the lifts one more time for Hera.



There was a long line to get onto the Hera lift, and I was starting to get antsy. I needed to make sure I was back down the mountain in time for us to leave for the bus. But it was definitely worth it. The lift for Hera goes all the way to the top of the mountain. It turns out that there's actually a Zeus 2 from the top, and even though it goes from the top of the mountain, it's still considered a beginner's slope.

A map of the runs, with the green line from the top showing the Zeus runs

The view from the top of Zeus 2.

This is the point at which I became a bit nervous. Even though I'd managed to make it the whole day without falling down once, and had even gained some confidence in my ability, I was completely unsure about the look of this one. But, I figured I was there, there were plenty of ski patrols everywhere, what could it hurt, right?

I managed to make it about half way down the Zeus 2 with no serious issues. The views were utterly amazing, and aside from having to concentrate extra hard on not falling over, I was having a bit of fun. Then I saw It. It was The Mountain. This was not a slope or steep incline on the run. This was The Mountain. I know this because the nice little yellow' caution' signs that tell you when a particularly challenging area lay ahead had changed into 'danger' signs. Not only this, but the ski patrol was not simply standing in the middle of the run like all the others had been. No. This one was standing behind a three sided, padded mini-fortress to keep people from running into him. I stopped in my tracks and stared in awe as people attempted, only a few successfully, to navigate down this Mountain. I knew I was going to fall. Not fail, just fall. I was ok with that. I was prepared. So, I took a deep breath, and tried to go as perpendicular as possible to The Mountain. I made it to one side ok, though a bit out of breath from the strain. Then I tried to turn. Remember I mentioned that when you turn, you speed up? Yeah, that's not a good thing on The Mountain. I lost the ability to slow down, lost my balance, went tumbling head over heels, and barreled head first into a Korean snowboarder that was also struggling down the mountain, while yelling unintelligible noises to try to warn her I was coming. After a hurried exchange of "I'm sorry, are you ok, I'm fine" in Korean (yes, I said all that in Korean after falling down The Mountain. I can communicate on a basic level now. Yay!), I scooted over to the side of the mountain and tried to figure out what to do.

The patrol was too far back up the mountain for me to try to get up to him. I had just gotten a call from Hong asking where I was, which meant I needed to get down the mountain as fast as possible and get back to the chalet because we needed to get on the bus to go home. So I decided to slide down in my boots the rest of the way down The Mountain, and then ski to the nearest lift and take that back, since that was still faster than me trying to ski down. When I stood up, The Mountain was so steep that all I had to do was keep my feet still, and I slid about 500 feet without doing anything but standing. Once I'd gotten to more level ground, I put my skis back on and hurried my way to the Zeus lift to go back down.

I got to the chalet on time, and since they'd had to check out of the hotel, they brought my bags and things for me. I gave the rental place back their equipment and we hurried towards the buses. Christian and Laura took a different bus home, and I hopped on the one with Dayna and Hong back to Sincheon. I spent most of the ride alternately reading Anansi Boys and resting my eyes, and after a nice meal in Sincheon of steamed fish, I headed back home to Uijeongbu.

A picture of the frosted trees that Laura took on the slopes

Tokyo! Part 1 (well overdue)

We flew out of Gimpo airport early Saturday afternoon, 12/27. Apparently if you fly into Haneda airport in Tokyo from Korea, you have to leave from Gimpo, and if you fly into Narita Airport (the larger of the two Japanese airports), you leave from Incheon (the larger of the two Korean airports). When we arrived at the airport, we decided to go through security first, and then find some breakfast. It's a good thing we did, because Kathryn hadn't updated her visa, and as we were going through immigration (which is always a slightly harrowing affair), she was asked to go purchase a single entry pass so she could leave and come back. Dayna and I didn't know this until after she came back from a room with one door and no windows, so we were very glad it was something a little bit of won was able to take care of.

The flight itself was uneventful - we had a nice lunch served on the 90 minute flight, and landed in Haneda. We had decided not to check our bags so that we wouldn't have to wait for them at the baggage claim, so we headed to immigration, and then to purchase our train tickets. Our plan was to spend the night in Tokyo, and then leave the next day for Kyoto, where we had booked a hostel for two nights. We had spent quite a bit of time researching train tickets, and had found a cheaper alternative to the Shinkansen train - the bullet train that connects most of the country. The Shinkansen would have cost us about 28,000 yen each (about $280), while the train tickets we purchased were only 23,000 yen for all three of us (about $77). After getting our tickets, we got a map of the Tokyo subway (SO confusing!), and directions on how to get to our hostel in Asakusa.

While looking at the rather daunting ticket machine, a man came up to us and asked, in English, if we needed help. We gladly told him yes, and he helped us buy our tickets, and even made sure we got on the right train. The metro in Tokyo is similar to the one in Seoul, but slightly smaller, and much quieter.

Dayna and her luggage inside a Tokyo metro car

It's illegal to talk on your cellphone on the metro, and there are signs everywhere reminding you to turn off your cell phone (not even just silence it!). It's very clean, and there are signs in the station to remind you not to drink and ride:

A polite sign reminding you to "please do it at home". Get drunk and pass out, that is.

We arrived in the early evening, and were thrilled with what we saw as soon as we got off the subway. The metro entrances are often well hidden in Tokyo, and are sometimes under buildings or in side streets, and not marked with large signs announcing their presence. The stop in Asakusa could easily be mistaken for the entrance to the mechanical room of a building, and it dumped us out onto a side street in what is considered "Old Tokyo", or Shitamachi.

We were greeted within 5 minutes by a group of jinricksha drivers who wanted to take us on a riding tour of Asakusa for only 2,000 yen for 10 minutes. We politely declined, since we wanted to check into our hostel, and $20 is a bit much for ten minutes (and the rickshas only take 2 and there were 3 of us).

Jinrickshas near our hostel.

We had very detailed directions to the hostel, and were amazed by the buildings and people that we saw as we walked.

Kathryn and Dayna in front of the Kaminarimon in Asakusa

We headed towards the Senso-ji, which is a temple that, according to legend, houses an image of the Buddhist goddess of mercy - Kannon. There was a large red gate that we had to walk by called the Kaminarimon, or Thunder Gate, next to a 5 story pagoda that I fell in love with. Past the gate was a small garden, with statues, a koi pond, and small shrine-like structures. Our directions then took us through a market street called Nakamise-dori, with just about every type of Japanese souvenir imaginable.

Nakamise-dori

We got slightly lost when we were looking for the amusement park, since it was not what we would have considered the western version of such things. But our timing was perfect, because when we finally found it and were walking by, there was a ninja street show being performed that looked like something out of an anime cartoon. We watched for a few minutes (not understanding any of what they were saying of course), before continuing towards our hostel.

Everybody was ninja fighting!

The people at our hostel were very nice, and gave us our sheets and instructions on how to get to the room. This was the first hostel I've ever been in. The costs are kept down because many of the conveniences of a standard hotel are absent, such as your bed being made for you, a private bathroom, or even private rooms. We happened to have a 4 bed room to ourselves for the night.

Yay bunk beds! Kathryn was more happy about it than she looks.

The beds were very comfortable, the blankets warm, and the room small but serviceable. There was a kitchen and a common room on the main floor, and computers you could use for a fee. We were starving, so after stashing our stuff in the room, we headed out for something to eat.

Wandering around looking for food made me feel like I had when I first arrived in Korea. I had no idea how to read the writing on the menus posted outside, and unless there was a picture of each item, we passed by with hardly a second glance. We probably roamed around for about 20 minutes before finally finding a place that we thought we could order from. It was a small Indian restaurant, and the one man working there spoke a little English. He took our drinks, made our meal, and even consented to having his picture taken.

Kathryn's looking at our Japan book, and Dayna's just looking strange at dinner.

My yummy fried rice.

After dinner, we had planned on going back to the Nakamise-dori to do a bit of window shopping, but it had closed down for the night. We did get to see quite a few traditional Japanese paintings on the metal doors that were covering all the shops.

Geisha painting in Nakamise-dori

We were also pleasantly surprised by how well lit the Senso-ji was lit up at night, and we took tons of pictures that look just like the ones from our travel guide. (By the way, if you ever travel to another country, I highly recommend using a Lonely Planet book. I've used one for almost everywhere I've gone in Korea. They're helpful, accurate, easy to follow, and they're meant for the single traveller on a budget, but mention family outings and higher priced items, too.)

Senso-ji area at night

We headed back to our hostel around 9 or 10, and noticed the rather odd and brightly painted graffiti on the walls near where we were staying.

Dayna and I in front of the colorful paintings by our hostel

There were also tons of bikes lined up against the walls. We couldn't figure out if they were rented, or for personal use, or community bikes, but the all looked the same and there was a security man who was policing the area and making sure they were all lined up just-so.

A bunch of bikes lined up, with our hostel in the background

But as we were heading back towards our hostel, we met a semi-creepy man, who decided to talk to us. We tried to keep walking, and kept our answers brief, if we answered at all. He asked us where we were staying, and Kathryn answered "we're not sure", even though we were a stone's throw from the entrance of our hostel. He mentioned he was staying there (oops!), and we just sort of nodded and kept walking. Which is how we came across the seediest, gaudiest, coolest looking "love motel" I've ever seen. The prices were listed outside by the hour, or by the night.

Askakusa's version of a love motel

After a sufficient time gawking at the hotel (and my semi-brave trek down the steps to see inside, only to be frightened away by an automated talking door and a couple coming out of the elevator), we headed back in for the night, easily avoiding our creepy neighbor.

The next morning we woke up leisurely around 8am, and checked out of the hostel. They were kind enough to let us check out, and then store our bags downstairs while we wandered around Asakusa. We planned on seeing a bit of the area, and then heading to Kyoto, where we had booked two nights at a hostel. We explored the area around Senso-ji for about an hour.

A temple roof and Buddhist statue near Senso-ji

Smoking is not allowed while you're walking on the street. You have to stand by one of these bins, and put your cigarette but inside when you're done. Everyone that we saw seemed to abide by these:

Smoking bins

We saw a tourist information center, so we headed inside to find out where we could catch the train we had tickets for to get to Kyoto. After a short wait, we spoke to the man and woman behind the counter, who laughed because apparently someone had been in earlier with the same tickets we had with the same question, and they weren't able to find any information for them. They suggested we try a travel agent down the street. The travel agent was closed, so we headed back to the tourist center. After a much longer wait, we were becoming a bit impatient with the long-winded people in front of us and the lack of staff (where had the nice man gone?). When it was finally our turn again, we convinced the woman to let us use her computer to find the exact name of the train we were trying to find. Well, it turns out that the tickets we had were for a train that takes 9 hours to get from Tokyo to Kyoto. Since we were only going to be there two days, this pretty much made the tickets worthless to us - why travel somewhere for 18 hours when you're going to be there less than 48 hours?

I felt really bad about this, because the trains had been my responsibility to research and book, and I had found this "great deal", but had apparently missed the whole 9 hour part (instead of the two hours that the Shinkansen train takes). Kathryn had booked our first hostel, and Dayna had booked the hostels in Kyoto. I suppose if I had known before hand our trip wouldn't have been much different than it turned out to be because the Shinkansen was so far out of our budget range that we would have just decided ahead of time to stay in Tokyo. I confirmed online that we would be able to get a refund on the tickets, so long as they weren't used, and we thanked the woman for letting us use her computer and then left.

So we headed back to the hostel with the small hope of finding an open room there, but as we expected they were fully booked for the night. We asked to be put on the waiting list, and then Kathryn and I started looking through the Japan book for something to do that day in the area while Dayna made a call to our hostel that we had planned on staying in on our last night. Luckily they had a few rooms available, so we picked up our luggage from downstairs, took our names off the waiting list, and headed out to the maze known as the Tokyo subway.