Robins Japan

The holiday is nearly done, we are busy with meeting many people and still im learning new things. For example Hoppy (ホッピー ) . We were at Yakiniku with old colleagues of my wife where I discovered that little bit unusual drink for me. It turned out to be some kind of light beer and you mix it in a glass with shochu(Japanese snaps). So I had half a glass shochu and mixed it with my hoppy and still much hoppy was left so I needed more shochu which then reminded me that I lately don't drink so much alcohol, so I got a little drunk. Funny drink. Also we could do a game for 500yen, where one of us could catch as much meat as possible with one hand to put it on the Yakiniku grill. I won the "who has the biggest hand challenge" on the table and was forced to do my best. がんばれ！(ganbare ) I managed around 300 gramm. Maybe not so much but also not bad. Anyway it was fun so thanks for forcing me :D The next day my wife was shopping in shinjuku and I was suddenly in akihabara in ...

These days in Tokyo its much about meeting my wife's friends and my father in law and sister in law. It's fun but also a hard schedule. Yesterday we were still in Tokyo but also far away from the inner city Tokyo life. First in a more suburban area around Akishima city where I learned a traditional game called Kendama. It's a dexterity game where you try to catch a ball on a string at the plates or the stick of the "ken" with which you hold the Kendama. It's hard to explain but if you're interested you can ask my friend Google. He also told me that in the edo area some geishas used that kind of game as a secret weapon if it was necessary. We basically just had a big laugh in trying it out :D Later that day we were still in Tokyo prefecture but the looking was more like the area of my father in law in tokushima. Much forests and mountains. The village is called hinoharamura. We were there to met friends and there was also a local festival with a lighti...

My fukuoka trip is nearly over. It was my second time in fukuoka. The first time was very short so this time we wanted it to be more relaxing. It totally worked out. Our hotel is close to the hakata station. With the station comes many shopping mals and restaurants. So we spent actually much time around that station area. Also we had some nice time with my mother in law, I met a former boss of my wife, enjoyed massages in the hotel, ate lots of udon noodles, had fun at the Hardrock Café and were at the cinema. Today we even managed to head to the really nice beach at fukuoka and I played there with my ukulele. Normally I'm playing more guitar but when it comes to travel, nothing beats the ukulele! The beach was pretty empty. Maybe couse it was no weekend but it's also nice that it wasn't so crowded. One other thing which was amazing was a trip to a really big Buddha statue. We saw the picture in a magazine for fukuoka travel and decided to check that out. Actually i...

So I'm sitting here and waiting for my flight to fukuoka, which means that the Okinawa time is over. Two days ago we wanted to try another beach in Naha but we had bad luck. The beach itself was nice but not allowed to swim in the water. The problem was that a typhoon some days before caused the staff to remove the jellyfish protection net and now they have to wait until the jellyfish are gone until they reinstall that net. Actually most beaches seemed to have such a net. That was new to me. So we kinda switched the plan and walked to an outlet store nearby. There we ate Okinawa Soba. Which reminds a little bit of udon noodles. Then we started to master the confusing bus system and after that drove with the monorail to the Shuri castle. The castle was really nice and pretty different from castles in Europe. Especially the inside had so many wood. Also it explained a little bit about the ryuku kingdom (Okinawa) and it's relationships between China and Japan. Its actually a ...

My first trip to Okinawa! Yeah! That was my thinking before. But at the first day it turned out that my expectations were a little bit high. It startet with a stressful check-in in Tokyo so we suddenly had no time for dinner. At Okinawa Airport first stop was something to eat. Nice Udon noodles :-) Taxi to the hotel was also OK. Hotel also what I expected. City beach near the hotel... ちょっと... Not so good. Small and the beach store decided to make much music for everyone. So it felt more like a small party beach. But just without party. Also the beach looked far from what I expected a beach look like as I knew it from Spain, Netherlands or France. But hey city Beach so my expectations were probably just wrong. Then we headed to a recommended street by catalloges called the international street. I would recommend it if you like to fresh up your Chinese and be at a tourist hot spot we're most things are just expensive or fake. Not to mention we actually tried to eat dinner there...

So, this is my seventh time in Japan and this time it's three weeks holiday. This time we will visit Tokyo, Okinawa and Fukuoka. The first day was actually surprising and interesting. While landing at Narita Airport we saw an airplane labeled with  "BvB" which is a big football club in Germany. I first thought they are in Japan.   After some research it turned out the club has a partnership with Mongolian airlines who are allowed to use that brand in boths interests. But still its nice to see unique painted airplanes. Later that day my wife wanted to go to her favorite hairdresser at jiyugaoka (自由が丘) there I found out that in Japan are much more male hairdressers then in Germany. But even more interesting was the Matsuri in front of the station we accidentally bumped in. They did traditional dances from the area. The dance is called Bonodori (盆踊り). Many people joint the dance on the street. So did we then and it was quite funny! After that heavy workout we really need...

So im back at home and finally there is time to write about my experience at my japanese wedding.  We already did all the official parts in Germany, so in Japan we only did the party which was exactly the " hiroen " party (披露宴). But lets start a little bit earlier.... The Preperation Finding a place At first you have to find a place where you want to make the party. Japanese people normally check many places, often Hotels or other Buildings where people do mainly weddings. But since we live in Germany we had not so much time for that and checked much beforehand at the internet and in our holiday we were visiting one place.  The Place we were visiting was gorgeous, actually it was like my wife was so excited and she liked it very much while i was very worried if we can afford such a place!  When we arrived we got picked up by the staff and everything seemed to be luxurious, we checked the prices and found out how to make it less expensive like ch...

Today I was at Saitama with my wife to pick up a time capsule letter from an old friend who runs a nice small coffee shop in a side street. (if you are a coffee enthusiast check Limenas Coffee they have coffee from all over the world) Saitama is direct to Tokyo. If you ask Saitama and especially Tokyo people they would say Saitama is countryside. The truth is 1.2 million people living in Saitama. That is bigger than Cologne or Duesseldorf and just slightly smaller than Munich which are some of the biggest city's in Germany. But what is big? Once a friend of mine who lives more countryside in Germany told about the big city she is now working. I asked how much people living there and it was 30.000. By myself I'm living in a city with 350.000 people and though that 30.000 is no big at all! But probably it's just a matter of perspective. If you compare Tokyo with more than 12 million people with Saitama 1.2 million people. Then yes Saitama is really small and countryside....

So, I'm back to tokyo and a little bit I have trouble to write about new things couse many things I already discovered (I can't write about every karaoke session even if there are epic :D). But I'm staying in a different area than usual. This time I'm at a hotel near osaki station. I'm actually surprised. I expected nothing but a near place to my wedding. But at the station there is the "Ohsaki New City" (I don't know why the hell there they wrote it with "h" and at the station without) so actually at the new west and new east exit of osaki station you have a nice area with a mall, many cafés and restaurants. Also it's not so crowded and if you still want the crowd it's pretty close to shibuya too.

久しぶりです (hisashiburi desu) long time no see. Soon i will travel my sixth time to Japan and since im having a wedding party there and some of my folks comming too i finally found motivation to write a short How-to Tokyo! This How-To is highly based on my personal experiences and my way of doing things, so keep in mind there are probalby different ways of handling things. At the end of the article is a small summary with some main tipps. So far i hope you enjoy my tipps and i will write soon from again from japan! Where to stay There are several Hotels in Tokyo. Still its wise to book beforhand. Sometimes there are busy seasons especialy when the students apply for universitys many hotels are booked out. Its wise to not stay near to the airport. Which part of the city depends a little on your intressts but anyway from every part you can easily visit the other districts with the train. For me i liked the area around korakuen near tokyo dome the most couse of easy access and many ...