reading and background for Japan

Our knowledge of Japan was rather limited and needed to be extended after our research on the Thai-Burma railway and Pacific war. Mike's insights from his travels and our enjoyment of Japanese gardens had given us some hints that we would enjoy our trip.
We started with a novel from Mullum; Kagami by Elizabeth Kata. It was a history of Japan from the Meiji restoration to the Kanto earthquake through 3 generations and gave a taste of aristocracy of Imperial Japan, Samurai and the modernisation and rise of the merchant class with western influence.
This book was enhanced with the TV series Shogun, the movie The Last Samurai and ?'s series on Japan. We also found other items online.
Lonely Planet was also useful for planning our trip as well as online sites.
I also read a Pulitzer prize winning book on Hirohito although I ran out of energy by the time it reached the 1930s and militarism, but it gave a background on the form of government with imperial, military and democratic forces.
Since returning, I have been reading a Japanese book on Hirohito written by a man who worked within the palace area.
It is intriguing that the people of Japan were so nice, welcoming and helpful. We were also very impressed with the level of organisation of trains and things.
We did accumulate a large number of plastic bags and found a lot of packaging on the food we bought, but this takeaway lifestyle was not one that we have in Australia.
We managed remarkably well with virtually no language and were rescued a couple of times by people who thought we needed help.

Singapore Brisbane Ipswich Toowoomba

Our stopover in Singapore was a bit long and unlike our previous time in December, we were on a flight full of Australians which made one wonder why we did not want decent boat people coming into Australia. However we had a good flight home and a very fast exit, ahead of most people. Our matching luggage had come off together in Japan, and we wondered when the first one came alone this time, reminding us of the long wait to get Dick's in Kolkata.
Em picked us up and we had a shower and coffee at her place. She then rove us in the Impreza to Ipswich where we had a 'comparison' property inspection at 1 pm which proved to be impressive. We then wanderered about and had a picnic lunch before the next inspection which we had liked the look of online a few weeks back. It had gone under offer almost immediately and had now come back on the market and we were not impressed with it after all.
Then we headed home to get a good rest before parkrun next morning.

Kyoto to Narita

We were packed and ready to go well ahead of time on Thursday morning. In fact the bakery shop at the station, where we planned to buy food did not open until 7 am and we had to wait at least 10 minutes.
So we got on our Shinkansen and enjoyed our trip to Shinagawa where we found the transfer to Narita Express uncrowded and with plenty of time. With my right leg almost not bending, it was a relief to do our last sightseeing from the train.
We also had lots of time at Narita airport and found an interesting Kabuki display and bought a nice dish as a souvenir.

Day 2 in Kyoto

We got on an early train to Arashiyama to avoid the crowds of tourists. It was full of school kids but they got off before we got to our station where it was fairly quiet to walk towards the bamboo forest. Just odd tourists. It was interesting when we got to a T junction and everyone went right to the sightseeing train station and we went left, finding a lovely garden walk down to the river.
Once at the river we started to see more tourists as it was getting to around 10am.
There was a nice shrine/garden area but we were tired and it was getting busy so we decided to head back to the train.
Our next destination was Nino Castle and the Nijo station was most impressive. However it was really busy with tourists so we decided to wander back toward the station. We found a nice garden with a boat in it, then an interesting clock shop opposite, where we went in and admired the stock with the owner.

I think it was this day that we went to the shopping centre.

Dinner was really disappointing. I chose it based on photos which were not on the menu we were given. After we had ordered ramen [again] someone else was served the food I had wanted.

Kyoto

We got our washing done in the morning and left it to dry in the special drying room cum bathroom.
Walking through the station we found a wonderful temple complex, the headed across to the river, walking along it for a while. There was still some blossom although we were past the peak.
We headed for the market and wandered through it but it did not thrill us. I think Kanazawa was better. We were looking for souvenirs and yukatas without success. We even tried the department stores but the ones we found were about $30 so we did not get it. Mainly because we do not like being in department stores.
Wandering down the street we got bus passes and some food at a Family Mart and walked to the first shrine where we had lunch. Then we got on a bus and rode to the palace which was very good.
We took another bus to a place which was crowded with tourists so we headed back to a railway station and caught a train home.
After a rest we wandered over to try the shopping centre near us. A different style but again not our fancy.
An evening walk in a park nearby was very pleasant with a lot of people doing athletics training on green grass.
We had dinner at a fast food place which was really good.