Trajik Air

To say I wasn't looking forward to this flight is a bit of an understatement. I'm typing this on the folding down seat table which is both broken and uncompromising in its dislike of fat people. My iPad is skidding towards me with the constant vibration of the terrifying propellor blade that is in perfect line with my face and all things being equal, I'd rather be on the ground.

That said, the service is great and the food (a quarter of a roast chicken) was actually quite nice and much better than some airlines I could mention. I've a sneaky suspicion that the 6' 5" steward prefers larger aircraft but watching him try to traverse the plane whilst holding trays of food is better than the inflight movie which, as you might imagine, doesn't really exist.

The view outside is phenomenal and since writing this I've passed over the Fan mountains, skirted Khojand and now seem to be turning towards Kyrgyzstan and my destination Bishkek. My friends Simon & Linda are already there having flown from Tashkent 3 days ago and we've promised to meet up and find a way to celebrate bonfire night without getting deported. 

I'm so behind on documenting this trip that I'm not sure how to approach it but so far I've wandered around the marble clad spotless streets of Ashgabat, been chased by Turkmen Militsia, stood at the edge of the Dvarza gas crater, walked across no-mans land on both sides of Uzbekistan and driven through the tunnel of death. I've suffered from pulled muscles, fatigue, exhaustion, a cough & cold and yes, the shits, but it's been worth every second. Low points include losing my iPhone and rushed goodbyes to new friends but on the whole, every day has had it's own special memories.

3 weeks in Kerplakistan

It's finally time and I'm half way there already! I've taken a bit of a gamble with the bag so we'll see if it turns up in Ashgabat but even if 'it' doesn't make it, 'I' will and if I have to dress like a Russian and scowl at everyone for the next 3 weeks then so be it.

For those of you not in the know, I've taken leave of my senses (again) but this time I'm attempting to find my way through 5 of 'The Stans' or to give it's formal name, Central Asia. The trip starts in Turkmenistan where I join an old acquaintance for a week long tour of what appears to be a very strange yet fascinating country that almost nobody appears to have heard of. After some desert camping, cave swimming and horse riding I cross over to Uzbekistan where I'll follow the Silk Road through the ancient cities of Bukhara and Samarkand before arriving in the former Soviet metropolis of Tashkent. Heading south I'll cross the border into Tajikistan and cross the Fan mountains on the road to Dushanbe. A quick flight to Kyrgystan will see me taking in the capital Bishkek before arriving in Kazakhstan and the bright lights of Almaty and Astana.

It's not been easy, in fact it's been a living nightmare at times, but I offer my sincere thanks to those that have held me together throughout the planning. No matter whether you've cut my hair, taught me Russian, got me drunk, kept me sane or most importantly inspired me to do it then believe you me, it means a great deal more than I can tell you.

So it's onwards now from the ludicrously busy yet mega-efficient Ataturk airport to the City of Love and, hopefully, my trusty backpack too.

Glory or insanity awaits!

C.

Peter & Paul Fortress

After a quick shuffle around our new home we decided to try to make the best use of the rest of the day by visiting the Peter & Paul fortress across the river from the main part of town. The best way to do this would be to wander up the road to one of Russia's most famous streets, Nevsky Prospekt, and keep walking until we hit Gostiny Dvor metro station.

Our first chalenge was to get into the station as every entrance to the subway was clearly signed 'Metpo' (Metro) yet we had to wander in and out a few times until it became clear that the adjacent building played host to the entrance and that we'd merely been using the underpass for the street. Once inside we managed to work out how to get a zheton each to make the one stop needed to cross the river. After nearly losing mine in the wrong slot we moved through the barriers and onto what is probably the longest escalator I have ever seen.

St. Petersburg's metro system turns out to have the deepest average station depth in the world due to the lousy geology of the swampy delta through which it was tunnelled. It is also the 12 busiest by passenger numbers and so what this means is that you spend around 5 minutes at each station on the escalators and about 1 minute on a train. The escalators are a wonderful working monument to Soviet engineering and operate almost constantly sometimes hauling several hundred people at a time from the cosy depths to the chilly surface.

Once across the river the first thing that strikes you about the fortress itself is how new it appears to be. It seems that much money has spent on renovating the colossal brick walls and the only evidence of the age of the structure can be found in the original gateways that funnel you into the cobbled courtyards within. We wandered through to see if it was still possible to climb the bell tower but we'd missed the last entrance so instead we headed onto the ramparts to catch a glimpse of the Winter Palace. The view was stunning but given the time of day it was also getting quite cold so we decided to return to base and get ourselves some dinner at a local restaurant.

Makarov was a cosy looking restaurant directly outside the Cathedral of the Transfiguration of our saviour and served rustic local dishes at 21st century prices. Feelings of being in someone's front room gained strength when a man suddenly started playing the piano and if it wasn't for the terrible service and the giant bill I would almost certainly have thought about maybe going again.

Outside meanwhile the darkness had prompted the floodlighting of the Church and to our surprise the door was open so we snuck in for a look at what turned out to be quite an event. Around 80 worshippers were gathered around the back whilst up front a collection of officials wearing gilded robes appeared to be wrapping an elderly man in a piece of green carpet. Once smothered, an old towel was draped over his head which he held in place with a large wooden cross and as soon as his vision was sufficiently restricted he was then forced to make a full lap of the church led by a small boy holding a crown on a pillow. As if this were not weird enough, several men in long dresses followed on shaking incense burners and chanting with pious pomposity whilst the others made sure the old man didn't fall out of his mobile sarcophagus.

It should be noted that throughout this ritual there was the most incredible sound coming from above the doorway provided by a small choir of exceptional quality. The sound was further enhanced by the unique shape of the church itself and, despite my overall derision of the event, was quite breathtaking. Anything that was not moving was gilded and combined with the flickering candlelight the whole room seemed to sparkle in exactly the same way that English churches don't. The other thing we noticed was that Russian Orthodox followers differ slightly from their western counterparts when symbolising the cross by alternating the last 2 steps right then left ergo; spectacles, testicles, watch and wallet which doesn't have the same ring the way my Granddad taught me!

Returning to the main event, the celebrants now moved toward centre stage to see if they could make their propitiations any more absurd by unwrapping the star of the show and engaging in what some may describe as watersports. The lead actor, now free of his Axminster jacket, held up the cross in a move which enthralled the congregation into frantically making their own cross symbols whilst nodding firmly in the direction of the stage. The co-stars then poured water over the cross as 'yer man' lowered then raised the timber to the accompanying fall and raise of pitch emanating from the choir. As if this weren't enough the whole process was followed by a monotone reading of some passage or other from one of the 4 best dressed wannabes. At the end of this nonsense they all rotated 90 degrees and the whole process began again for what we suddenly realised was for the benefit of all 4 sides of the church.

It was at this point that we decided to leave but our exit was to be hampered by the congregation who were in various degrees of prostrations, some of them actually kissing the ground on which we were to walk. Whilst this wasn't necessary we were nonetheless touched and sidestepped between them in search of more secular ideals in the form of the nearest Metro station.

How to shave with no less than 3 rooms, a kettle and some good travel advice

Step 1. Fill the kettle, turn it on and wait for several hours until it boils
Step 2. Insert the plug that Michael Palin reminded you to take with you into the basin near the toilet
Step 3. Fill the basin with boiling water and top up with cold water as required
Step 4. Apply shaving foam
Step 5. walk through kitchen and into shower room to use mirror
Step 6. shave
Step 7. walk back through kitchen to toilet and rinse razor
Step 8. repeat steps 5, 6 & 7 until fully shaved

Са́нкт-Петербу́рг

Given that we're already on day 5 of an 11 day trip to the Motherland I'm not sure how I can possibly catch up with a meaningful account of our journey but I suppose something is better than nothing so here goes something. I'll start at the beginning (after the earth cooling of course) and try to make sense of why I'm updating my thoroughly neglected blog on a Monday evening from a small flat in Leningrad with 7 mosquito bites and a warm bottle of Grolsch.

Many moons ago my Father and I discussed the possibility of going to Russia for a few days to take in the sights (me) and practice speaking Russian (him). What we didn't realise is that it would take over 10 years to realise what should be a relatively simple, if not expensive, task.

After several months of planning and as much up-front investment as possible we finally left Blighty on one of Stelios' less than private jets and undertook what is probably the smoothest crossing of the North Sea in living memory. Before we knew it we were being chauffered in a very nice Mercedes taxi down an empty 4 lane highway towards the quiet streets of Helsinki.

Yes I know that's not in Russia but that's all part of the grand plan, the plan being to 'do Russia' by train. Now you'd be quite right if you were to say that you can get to Russia without flying but there are two reasons why we've opted for flights either side, one is time and the other is Belarus!

Those of you who've read my humble journal will be well aware of my shortcomings in Belarus regarding the overstaying of my visa and although it may have been a trivial 3 hours they seem to me the kind of people to remember. Notwithstanding the beaurocracy there was also the cost and most importantly the time taken to traverse large swathes of europe in what would in fact be old ground for both of us. Thus the start point was to be Finland and the end point Latvia where we'd pick up our only other flight, this time compliments of Mr O'Leary.

So, apart from a quick day sightseeing in Nokialand we more or less headed straight for Eliel Saarinen's iconic station and straight aboard the 07:23 'Sebelius' express train to St. Petersburg. Once on board we discussed the budget nature of the trip, and the need to conserve funds as much as possible, over a champagne breakfast two carriages away from our first class compartment. Outside the train the spindly scandinavian trees waved us on towards our first glimpse of the Former Soviet Union in the shape of a run down but nonetheless active border control. As expected there were guns, dogs and of course big hats but no obvious animosity towards us whilst we were relieved of our passports, a fact I put down to Papa's grey hair :-)

The train shuffled on and gradually picked up speed and we began to see the signs of a sparse and almost forgotten part of what has to be said is an uttlerly enoromus country. Our passports were notable by their absence and it took around 30 minutes before a Finnish official returned them to us after reading our names out with such great difficulty and confusion I thought to myself "now you know what it's like for us to try to understand Finnish".

As the train headed further east we noticed an increasing number of grubby tankers linked together like burnt sausages waiting to be filled or emptied of their cargo of benzine. Thoughts of a catastrophic explosion passed through my mind but were quickly replaced by our new game; reading the Cyrillic on the passing stations. I probably managed one or two but I was no match for Warwickski and his uncanny ability to not be fooled by the 'false friends' C (pronuced Suh), B (pronounced Vuh), P (Pronounced Ruh), H (pronounced Nuh) and Y (ponounced ooh). There are of course all the other weird letters you've all seen (пьющий is obviously pronounced p'yoosh-sheeh) but they're actually not that hard once you know them. What is hard is to see the word PECTOPAH and to ponounce it properly as RESTORAN, something I need to get better at if I'm to read an original copy of crime & punishment any time soon.

After just enough time to both tire of the journey and start to anticipate our arrival in Russia's second city the suburbs began to envelop our train. Before long we could see swarms of peasants milling around street vendors under the backdrop of imposing yet crumbling soviet apartment blocks whilst trams and trolleybuses trundled down dusty streets before we finally pulled up to a waiting platform at Finladskia station.

Our cosy bubble of plenty was immediately replaced with a stark looking station and a drop of at least 10 degrees in temperature. The other thing missing it seemed was our pickup contact and we would shortly discover that he was never going to be found on account of not having been asked to come at all. Backtracking somewhat we then realised we had litle choice but to re-negotiate with the cab driver that moments earlier I had shooed away and we settled on a price roughly double what we should pay rather than the triple for which he originally asked. Welcome to St. Petersburg!

We set off in a fume ridden Lada where it occurred to me that as the pickup hadn't been arranged then access to the apartment may also be a problem so I phoned the emergency number from our booking sheet and spoke again with the muffled voice at the other end. She revealed that the cleaner should still be there and would let us in. This gave Dad his first chance to converse with a native Russian and the two of them chatted like old friends whilst the driver 'Nicholai' bounced over warped tram lines and undertook cars at what seemed the full limit of the cars capability. The conversation was fascinating and I did manage to understand the gist of it at first but the extend of Pop's Rooski was greater than I'd realised and soon I had no idea what they were talking about.

After not much more than 5 minutes we arrived at a very sorry looking entranceway to what was to be our home for the next few days. I called my covert contact to ask her to send the cleaner to let us in and Dad wandered into the courtyard with Nicholai whilst I guarded the bags. After a few minutes I could see a hardened Babooshka with her hands on her hips joining in with a 3-way conversation with which I was delighted not to be involved. At last there was clarity and we paid Nicholai almost what he'd originally asked for and got his number with a view to asking him to take us to Moscow station in a few days time.

And that's it, we had arrived, the only thing left to do now was to wander down the road and take a first look at the beautiful city and work out how the hell to see it all in a little over 2 days!

Where's Christons

He's in Russia with his new travel partner Warwick Price and he'd be quite happy to tell you about it if he could just get 5 minutes spare to put finger to keyboard in what has turned out to be (even for me) a very tight timetable of trains, planes & hydrofoils.

So as ever readers (both of you), I'll endeavour to summarise our activities to date and maybe even through in a photograph or two providing there's time to spare at the end of each day.

Da sveh danye for now,

C.

Where's Christons?

He's alive and well in a capsule hotel. A stupid timetable of sights, sounds, smells and experiences has left me little time to update you all but I've taken the afternoon off ;-) and I'll try to summarise the last few days of mayhem (if I can that is)!

Japan Day 6 - Train time :-)

Alex walked the dog and then came back to say goodbye before rasping into the city on his scooter. Chisato and I took Daiki to Hopia where I said goodbye and gave him a hug. Walking away from Hopia as he cried in the arms of the staff evoked emotions that I rarely experience and realised then that I would miss being around him a great deal.

Chisato drove us down to Kagoshima station and we popped into Starbucks for a coffee and a cake. After a well needed caffeine boost I said my final goodbye to Chisato and headed off to catch the train. Kagoshima station is enormous and even has a huge Ferris wheel attached to the roof in much the same way the British stations don't. The final approach to the brand new Kyushu Shinkansen was every bit as slick as one would expect and as luck would have it, a train was to depart in less then 10 minutes.

The Shinkansen, or Bullet Train, is unlike any other train I can think of, at least on my planet anyway. The sides are flat and box-like with small Japanese size doors and oversized aircraft-like windows. The platforms are quite high in comparison to Western trains making the roof appear lower so the whole thing looks seriously cool! The space-age station is less than 3 years old but I couldn't understand why the platform seemed to point West instead of North.

The interior is every bit as box-like as you'd expect from looking at it but the seats are spaced out with 'Business Class' generosity. A digital display presents the itinerary in Japanese and English and the announcements are equally top-notch. As we head off (and this still amuses me) between 0 and 1 second past the scheduled departure time you move forward in a steady but consistently increasing velocity that holds for a while before gently ramping up to around 160 MPH.

It then becomes clear why we are heading West as almost all of the currently operating section of this line is tunnelled through the mountains right the way through to Yatsushiro and so it doesn't matter which way it goes, they've just blasted it through the mountains at what I can only imagine to be phenomenal expense. The carriage barely moves and feels like very mild turbulence at worst and smooth flight at best and given the fact that you are almost always in a tunnel, the dark windows really make you feel as though you are in a plane.

Sadly, the remaining Northern section is not yet complete and so we switch trains with Japanese efficiency and trundle through the rest of the island at a more leisurely but still impressive 80 MPH. As Hakata station draws near, the automated announcement broadcasts its polite message in Japanese, English, Korean and Chinese before we're invited to leave the train bang on time and rather impressed.

Fukuoka is quite big and I wasn't planning to stop here but I'd been told that to miss a Hakata Ramen would be like going to the capital of Ukraine and not having a chicken Kiev. Actually, I've done that and so to make sure I didn't make another culinary faux-pas I chucked my bags in a locker, shoved in my 5 x 100 yen coins and clicked the door shut seconds before realising I'd left my LP inside :-(

Rather than waste any more money on retrieving my trusty guide I thought I'd try and live without it so I wandered down to the subway station and faced up to the reality of Japanese transport, incomprehensible signage! I stared at it for a while and then thought I'd stumble through it using the numbers as the basis to buy a ticket but just as I was about to gamble on my choice of button, the familiar word 'English' appeared in the corner of the screen. I pressed it and not only did the instructions magically make sense but a little voice pointed out that it was now operating in 'English mode'.

If you've ever been to Oxford Circus you'll appreciate that emerging from the tube you are faced with a perfectly mirrored crossroads that makes it extremely difficult to work out which way is which. Tenjin (Fukuoka's CBD) is no different and to help confuse you further, all maps seem to ignore the tradition in other countries of making North point up and rather opt for the best way to present the city from the point of view of the map maker. The upshot of this was that I had to descend back into the bowels of Tenjin subway station, which is truly enormous and mimics the crossroads in exactly the same way, to find some more information.

Given Fukuoka's thriving tourist trade (at least in the Japanese sense) it didn't take too long to find a tourist information booth that provided maps but the whole point of having my LP guide was to try and locate the famous Ichirin Ramen bar that I my stomach was now equally keen to . I'd remembered roughly where it was (and what it was called) and after a few minutes I managed to work it out and headed back outside to a now rainy Fukuoka. Here I was faced with musical pedestrian crossings and towering buildings, most of which had signs on them and fortunately for me in English. It took a few more minutes for me to properly get my bearings and my perseverance was soon to pay off.

Ichirin Ramen bar is awesome! If you've ever been to vote and whilst choosing which git to install in office you'd thought to yourself "I'd really like a bowl of noodles" then this is the place for you. First of all, you walk in to a very dark series of corridors and the Japanese hostess bleats out the standard welcome before asking you for your ticket. You then go back outside into the rain and see the vending machine that is adorned with various side dishes but only a single button at the top entitled "Ramen". The customisation of your ramen is what gives Ichirin its edge over other Restaurants and upon returning to the narrow passageways inside you are soon faced with a series of single seat booths, many of which are already occupied by local ramen addicts.

You sit down at your booth and much like going to vote you are given a form but this one is to customise and enhance your ramen. The booth is somewhat cramped, at least from the point of view of your portly narrator, and you can't help but notice the bamboo screen covering the lower 10 inches of the wall in front of you whilst you start to complete the incredibly detailed questionnaire that has been conveniently written in both English and Japanese. The choices are mostly on a 1 to 5 scale concerning strength of overall flavour, garlic, secret sauce, fattiness?!? and onion content. You can even flip to page 2 and make additions of more pork, egg and all manner of things but these cost extra and so other than more pork I stuck to the basics. Once you've completed the form you press a button and the bamboo screen immediately lifts up to a show the midriff of a Ramen chef welcoming you in the standard manner before taking your tickets, questionnaire and if applicable, additional money. You can then help yourself to water from a bar style tap whilst trying to stoop low enough to see if you can work out what on earth is behind you.

This neck stretching is fruitless as all you can see are the bamboo screens of your fellow eaters in the corridor opposite and so you recompose yourself and wait anxiously for your lunch. It is of course true to say that Ramen should be slurped and this is actively encouraged although I'm really not sure how you could eat one in silence anyway. I'd prepared for this event by wearing one of my many black tee shirts in the hope that it would hide even the most subtle of noodle-borne splashbacks.

Within minutes the screen pops open and your perfect ramen sits there steaming in front of you and the bamboo screen closes once again to allow you solitude in this amazing place. It is delicious although I have to say I think I was spoiled in Kagoshima as the meat was in no way comparable to Kyushu's finest glistening belly pork. The soup on the other hand was heavenly and I proceeded to attack it's generous, garlicy goodness with gusto!

Once I'd slurped back the last of the soup I sat transfixed wondering how on earth I could transplant this entire restaurant and its staff to the UK and then live in it forever. Anything else, at least at that moment, seemed pointless and it was quite a struggle to pop myself out of the cabin and return to the dreary streets of Fukuoka.

Despite the rain (and the will to remain in Ichirin all day) I wandered off in the general direction of the station rather than descending into the subway. I passed by endless vending machines and particularly attractive women before arriving at Canal City which is a cheesy shopping complex/cinema/hotel complex. By this time I realised that after such an amazing lunch (I'll stop talking about that now I promise) Fukuoka couldn't possibly offer me anything better in the time I had although the major Sumo competition was tempting. I'd seen some wrestlers in the station when I arrived but the main event wasn't to start until much later and so I grabbed my bags and jumped back on the Shinkansen and headed up to Hiroshima.

Hana hostel was to be my new home for the next 2 nights and I was a little apprehensive about jumping back into the backpacker life, especially after 4 nights of family life in Kagoshima. Nevertheless I made up my bed and headed straight out to the most obvious place I could think of as I was quite tired and knew that I wouldn't be out for long.

The A-Bomb dome as it is known is the remains of the Hiroshima prefectural hall and it was situated several feet away from the Hypo-centre of the worlds first offensive atomic explosion. As you might imagine, the whole area is somewhat haunting and I'm not sure if I can explain my feelings on the subject nor whether or not I should. The park opposite contains a number of memorials of that fateful event that occurred at 09:15 on the 6th of August 1945 and I had a quick look around before heading in to town. After all, tomorrow would allow me much more time to take everything in.

I wandered back towards the centre of town and the cold evening was made all the more intense by the fact that my fabulous, wonderful, ramen (sorry) had worn off and I was becoming tired, hungry and cold. As a pick me up I thought I'd have a can of coffee so I simply revolved on the spot until I saw a vending machine and reviewed the products on offer, one of which was a bottle of tea! I'm sceptical about milk at the best of times so I was tickled pink when I saw that the tea was not only black but hot as well. I am now hooked on hot bottled tea as this one washed away the fatigue and renewed my spirits in that curious way that only tea can (or is it canned tea ;-). I redoubled my efforts to find an interesting sounding place mentioned in the LP that served one of Hiroshima's specialities, Okonomiyaki, in a multitude of similar outlets all housed together in one building.

I sat down at one of the many eager vendors stalls in front of a hot plate, very similar to those found in Teppenyaki restaurants. The owner took my order of the basic offering and started by pouring pancake mix into a small circle in front of me before piling it high with shredded cabbage, onions and all manner of bits and pieces, some of which looked like carpet dust. He then topped it off with a portion of udon noodles and some strips of pork before flipping it over to sizzle. The whole time his assistant busied himself doing everything the owner didn't want to such as preparing the next batch of noodles and cleaning up, Japanese hierarchy in action! Once the strange pile of pork lined vegetables had sizzled for a while he cracked an egg and spread it around into a disk before placing the whole lot on top of it and then smothering it in a hoisin type sauce. Final preparations involved sprinkling all sorts of stuff on top of it before moving it towards me. He then passed me a small bowl, some chopsticks and a metal spatula with which to slice off chunks and serve myself small portions whilst keeping the rest warm. It was, as I'm sure you've already guessed, delicious and I'd happily have another one some other time, providing I was hungry enough to finish it!

Having had 2 delicious meals in one day I thought I'd better head back to the hostel for a rest and to try and keep up with what you should know by now to be a rather aggressive writing schedule. My roommates were a curious looking Japanese teenager with more mobile phones than fingers and a curious habit of getting in and out of bed to answer the various streams of texts that they attracted as well as an older man from Taiwan. The Taiwanese chap had a large camera (Nikon I'm sad to say ;-) and managed to explain he was from Taiwan until his English gave out forcing us to make appreciative facial gestures until we settled back into our bunks.

After catching up on various computer based duties I settled down to a long but fairly light sleep wondering where to start in the morning, the Yamato museum or the Mazda factory, find out which choice I made in the next exciting post!!!

Japan Day 5 - I didn't think I'd be eating Kimchee ever again!

Although Alex had the day off, Chisato had to work and as I emerged bleary eyed from my bedroom I watched her put the finishing touched to her Bento before heading off to town. Daiki was as lively as ever and chomping on some rice whilst watching Battle Force (a Japanese Thunderbirds type kids program but with grown men in silly coloured suits instead of puppets). Alex had already confessed to not being a fan of the Japanese breakfast and so given Daiki's choice to not go to Hopia (a portmanteau of Hope and Utopia but basically a nursery) we thought we'd all go to the German bakery down the road and have a Danish and a can of coffee.

At the 11th hour, Daiki announced that he did want to go to Hopia after all and so we grabbed Oscar and the 4 of us headed off down the road. Hopia is much like any nursery I suppose apart from the Japanese girls with face masks on who lunge at the children upon arrival in order to stick a thermometer in their ear, presumably to avoid swine flu. Alex pointed out that it would be a good idea to leave quickly as Daiki has a 6th sense when one or more parents leave the scene but we knew that the floods of tears would be short lived and he'd settle down with his friends in the playground.

Once we'd taken Oscar back we jumped into Alex's car and set our sights on Pastry 'und' Kafee. As ever, upon entering the store, the girls behind the counter sang out in unison graciously welcoming us inside. It's worth mentioning that this happens EVERYWHERE and it still takes you by surprise each and every time you walk through the door. We had a selection of pastries but as we were eating in we opted for the free coffee from a machine rather than the canned refrigerated alternative.

Set up for the morning we drove down around the coast of the bay and I grumbled once again about Sakurajima's reluctance to perform on my behalf. After 10 minutes or so we arrived Sengan-en which is a collection of a number of historic sites, the detail of which I will omit from this journal but will be happy to discuss in more detail upon request.

One tall tale that I will repeat is that of the Bombardment of Kagoshima AKA, the Anglo-Satsuma War which was prompted by the Namamugi incident. There are many accounts of the event but in essence Britain wanted The Satsuma government to pay reparations for the death of one its countrymen, Charles Lennox Richardson. Richardson had recently ridden his horse too close to a procession whilst showing some of his friends around his latest homestead. His colonial insouciance caused the now deeply offended Satsumas little option but to slash him with their swords and ultimately kill him. Typically, the British sent an entire fleet into the bay with instructions to level the town unless the Satsumas cough up and shortly thereafter a fire fight took place in the bay. Hundreds of Japanese houses were destroyed by the British but, much to their surprise, a single Satsuman cannonball blasted the captain and commander of the British flagship HMS Euryalus into the next life forcing an immediate cessation of fighting. With this truce came the offer of industrialisation in the form of factories and the sale of munitions by none other than Sir William Armstrong.

Anyway, food is more important than history and so Alex then took me the Bradshaw family's favourite restaurant in Kagoshima. The food was beautifully presented as ever and was based around a large piece of Kagoshima's famous succulent black pork. The bar had several dozen bottles of Shochu lining its shelves but neither of us fancied drinking any more, particularly after Friday night's blowout.

After lunch we picked up Chisato from work and headed back to pick up Daiki from Hopia. On the way, it finally happened and much to my delight (although barely visible through the rain) Sakurajima finally acquiesced and pumped out a huge billowing cloud of dirty ash ridden smoke. It wasn't the face to face encounter that I had hoped for but nevertheless worth seeing.

A short trip to the supermarket later and Alex scurried off to his caligraphy class whilst Chisato and I relaxed in the house with an extremely well behaved Daiki and a rather grumpy Oscar.
As it was my last night, I was taken to a local Korean barbecue restaurant, where we feasted on Pork, Beef, Rice, Soup, Kimchee and Barbecued cabbage (try it!). It was a terrific end to a fantastic visit and I'm extremely grateful to the whole family for making me feel so welcome.

Later that night, Alex tried out some more calligraphy only to be somewhat outdone by Daiki's awesome script! Chisato and Daiki headed off to bed and I amused myself watching Alex put together a video outlining the history of Japan that was to be shown to some new students later that week. If the first 30 seconds are anything to go by, it should be good but I couldn't stay awake to see the results so it will have to wait until later.